Blood Harvest

Set in 1929, Randall's uneven debut explores anti-immigrant prejudice in a small rural New England community. When Angus MacKay catches his precocious young cousin, Jackie Sue, getting intimate with teenager Angus DeCosta in the bushes, the MacKay menfolk first beat and strip DeCosta, then throw him off a bridge into a river. DeCosta's father arrives in time to fire some birdshot at the MacKays and rescue his battered son. Various human narrators relate the story of the violent aftermath of this incident, including a corrupt local lawman, Marshal Ichabod Lawe. Late in the action the author adds a jarring fantasy element—the voices of Chief, a dog, and Kaw, a crow. Some readers may wonder why Chief speaks in simple, primitive sentences (“Chief push man-pups, Chief bark”), while Kaw can imagine he'd make a better god than “Bright-Eye,” i.e., the sun. While Randall succeeds in educating the reader about the role of the Ku Klux Klan in the Northeast during this period, the unsophisticated story line and thin characterizations don't do justice to the important history lesson. (May)