Date: 26 June 2016
Location: Pat & Carol
In June, the Happy Bookers met at Pat & Carol’s house to discuss Between Black and White by Robert Bailey. Those of us who had read The Professor, his first novel, had eagerly awaited his second offering and were not disappointed. The story begins a year after the events of the first novel. Retired law professor, Tom McMurtrie and Rick Drake, his former pupil, are now partners in a small practice in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Bocephus Haynes has been charged with the murder of Andy Walton and has called on Tom, his old friend and former teacher, for his defense. But everything in Bocephus’s back story appears to condemn him. As a small child in Pulaski, Tennessee, he watched as his father was lynched. When he finished law school, he returned to his home town, which incidentally is known for being the birthplace of the Ku Klux Klan, to practice law and to pursue justice in his father’s name. It was no secret that Bo has always believed that Andy Walton led that lynch mob forty-five years ago, and now Andy’s murdered body has been found hanging from the same tree….and there’s loads of incriminating evidence as well. If Bo is not guilty, then who is? That’s what Tom and Rick have to find out and there is not much time. Between Black and White is another page-turner in the best tradition of legal thrillers. Our monthly pot-luck meal ended in the best tradition, too: peach cobbler made from fresh local peaches and topped with vanilla ice-cream.
—Bonnie