Crossing Bully Creek

In Crossing Bully Creek, Margaret Erhart employs an eclectic array of characters to chronicle the sometimes torrential swiftness, sometimes trickling slowness of change through the generations. At the heart of the story is Henry Detroit, Northern-born owner of Longbrow Plantation, now on his deathbed as the 1960s come to a close. Around him swirl servants, hired hands, and family, all gathered to preside over the death of life as they know it in the South. At Henry's bedside is his wife, Rowena, granddaughter of William Tecumseh Sherman, and Lewis Brown, who has attended several generations of bird hunters. Ready to come at the least word is Cole Jones, who runs the plantation for Detroit's son. Farther afield are Byrdine Dean, a cafe owner and palm reader, Ray Luken, who runs the dogs, and young Roosevelt Davis, an epileptic who looks for his road to redemption in books other than the Bible. Moving back and forth between the 1960s and the 1920s, Crossing Bully Creek captures the essential tragedy of race relations as well as the birth pangs of a more complex, more hope-filled South. Margaret Erhart's characters, black and white, recall a time when old traditions begin to give way, subtly transformed by the small, determined acts of a few individuals.