Riggins Row
by
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It is 1953, the dog days of summer are upon us. The heat is almost unbearable as Hessie goes about her chores while dodging the fly paper strips hanging down from the ceiling. As she continues cleaning her small house that basically looks like every other house on Riggings Row she begins dancing to Big Mama Thornton’s rendition of “Hound Dog” she hears playing on her neighbor’s radio. Her little house permeates with the smell of simmering pots of pinto beans, collard greens and ham hock.
Riggins Row is a small curvy dirt road with twists and turns ascending up a hill with no outlet. Along each side of the road are small weathered clapboard houses with tiny porches for sitting outside gossiping. Each house is in dire need of repair, one needing more than the next. At its entrance stands what some say is a haunted old oak tree appearing more dead than alive; perhaps due to the many lynchings throughout its history.
Hessie is our housekeeper and she along with her fellow maids keep up with all the latest gossip, in both the white and colored communities. Hessie, the bearer of bad news tells of a riot brewing between the white supremacy group and the colored community, when the sordid affair between the beautiful, married and wealthy Southern Belle; Savannah and her very masculine, handsome, colored employee; Jasper became known.
Savannah nor Jasper could ever have imagined the horrific consequences that their provocative love affair would have on them and everyone around them. Consequences filled with sensuality, drama, action, power and in spite of it all, love.
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About the Book
Most white folks refer to Riggins Row as a shanty town. No white man would dare show up there unless it was daylight. No self-respecting white woman would be caught there at all. But for Johnny Ruth and Hessie, it’s home. All of their relatives had lived and died right there on the Row.
Johnny Ruth and Hessie grew up together, becoming best friends and neighbors, living side by side on Riggins Row in the middle of a small rural town in Tennessee. It’s 1953, and both women are domestic maids who feel privileged to be working for prominent families who treat them well. It’s a better situation than most other domestics have in these parts.
Johnny Ruth works for the Porters, the wealthiest family in the county. Charles Porter, a well-to-do attorney, is closely connected to the Ku Klux Klan. His beautiful wife, Savannah, is concealing her sordid, secretive past. Unlike her husband, however, Savannah doesn’t have a racist bone in her body. When Charles hires Jasper Thomas, a black man, to be Savannah’s driver, he has no idea that Jasper and Savannah will become best friends and confidants, adding fuel to an already smoldering fire within the community.
Quick to notice this friendship, Johnny Ruth warns them of the far-reaching affects this taboo relationship could have—not only on them, but their families, friends, and possibly the whole town.
About the Author
Suzann Cordell has written many short stories. Cordell worked outside the home most of her life and is currently retired, living in the small Tennessee town in which she grew up. She is a widow with two children and four grandchildren. This is her debut novel.
Talk with the author: suzann.cordell@yahoo.com