Guest Post: The Villain of Threads – Threads by Charlotte Whitney w/ giftcard giveaway

THE VILLAIN OF THREADS:  A Depression Era Tale

Everyone loves to hate the villain.  The loathsome Brother Johnson

Spoiler Alert:  You May Want to Read the Book First

The reader first meets Brother Johnson when he is conducting a Sunday service at the little Parson Creek Church while the regular preacher is traveling to Canada for a family funeral. Eleven-year-old Irene describes him:

     “Brother Johnson preached at our church this morning.  He’s from the Camp Meeting down near Fonsha and is what you call a revivalist. He preaches hellfire and brimstone and all the bad things awaiting sinners in hell.”

      Revivalist preachers were not uncommon during the Great Depression so his presence is not enough to cause alarm.  He regularly conducts revival meetings in an outside venue, the Camp Meeting, yelling out for sinners to come to God, encouraging people to speak in tongues, and handle rattlesnakes to profess their faith. However, intuitive little Nellie who is seven, instinctively knows that the Brother is evil.  In the church service she hides behind fat Mrs. Vandenberg, moving every time the she does so the evil preacher can’t see her.

      When Brother Johnson passes the collection plate for the third time during the service, people uncomfortably pass it on without adding any more coins.  It’s becoming clear Brother Johnson’s motivations are more worldly than godly.

      During the course of day-to-day events the reader finds out that two little girls from a neighboring community have disappeared.  Later we find out that May, a thirteen-year-old neighbor girl, from has been raped and left for dead.  These horrible events remain, until the end, unsolved.

       Nellie’s first solitary encounter with Brother Johnson occurs early in the book, after she’s on her way to creek to play.

     “There he stood, a large ugly man wearing a dirty brown hunting jacket.  He held a knife and slid it from hand to hand.  ‘You say anything ‘bout seeing me, little girl, and you’ll be disappearing,’ he growled.  “If you know what’s good for you, you’ll stay outa the woods.  There’s lots of bad stuff back there.  Bad things for little kids.  Otherwise you choose your torture.”  He laughed out loud, an ugly low-pitched chuckle.”

    Finally, at the climax of the book, Brother Johnson again appears after Irene and Nellie have gone down to the woods to play.  Nellie has climbed one of her favorite trees.

    “Well, I was kinda enjoying the view from the top of the oak. . . .  Then I heard somethin’ on the ground.  I looked down at Irene and saw a large man leaning over her.  He put his hand over her mouth, but I could see her struggling to git away.  From behind it looked like the evil preacher, Brother Johnson.  I wanted to run up to the barn to find Pa, but he’d made it very clear that Irene and I were to stay together.  Besides what if the evil Brother killed Irene before Pa could come back with his shotgun?”

     So we have not only a villain who is claiming to be a religious man, but one that is a child molester, and perhaps, a murderer. Brother Johnson is not a nice person.

     “Now the Brother was carrying Irene into the bus as she was kicking and flailing her arms.  He never looked up my way.  I don’t think he knew I was up in the tree.  Still, he might be pretending so he could come back and git me.”

Threads
by Charlotte Whitney

GENRE:   Historical Fiction, Women’s Lit, Book Club Lit

BLURB:

It’s a boring, hardscrabble life for three sisters growing up on a Michigan farm during the throes of the Great Depression.  But when young Nellie, digging for pirate treasure, discovers the tiny hand of a dead baby, rumors begin to fly.  Narrated by Nellie and her two older sisters, the story follows the girls as they encounter a patchwork of threatening circumstances and decide to solve the mystery

Excerpt

When I got home from high school today, Jeepers, I knew immediately that something wasn’t right. Aunt Hazel and Ma were sitting out by the milk house on a couple of turned-over pails, and Irene and Nellie were sitting on the ground close by. All of them were looking towards the lane that goes down to the two meadows and onto the woods and crick. The county sheriff’s car sat empty near the silo. No one was talking.

Worried, I raced across the yard. Could Pa have gotten hurt? As I ran toward Ma I looked over at the west field and saw Ace and King hitched up to the wagon piled with brush. Rover was sleeping near the wagon.

It looked like Pa had finished about half of the field, but he was nowhere in sight. Pa never leaves the horses hitched up when he isn’t working. When he comes up for noontime dinner he al- ways puts them in the barnyard so they can rest, too. Naturally, I panicked.

When Ma saw me running over she jumped up and walked over to me, a strange look on her face.

“Is Pa all right?” I blurted out.

“Yes, yes,” Ma answered. “He and Elmer are down in the woods with Sheriff Devlon.” Nellie pushed me aside and threw her arms around Ma’s legs.

“Nellie thinks there’s a dead baby in the woods,” Irene piped up, all knowingly. “The Sheriff’s gone with them to look at it. Who in their right mind would bury a baby in that woods? Nellie musta gotten it all mixed up.”

AUTHOR Bio and Links:

Charlotte Whitney grew up in Michigan and spent much of her career at the University of Michigan directing internship and living-learning programs. She started out writing non-fiction while at the University and switched to romance with I DREAM IN WHITE. A passion for history inspired her to write THREADS A Depression Era Tale chronicling the stories of three sisters on a farm during the throes of the Great Depression. She lives in Arizona, where she loves hiking, bicycling, swimming, and practicing yoga.

BUY LINK:

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/THREADS-Depression-Tale-Charlotte-Whitney-ebook/dp/B07ZBN35JF/ref

IMPORTANT LINKS:

Author’s Website: http://www.charlottewhitney.com

Facebook Author Page: https://www.facebook.com/CWhitneyAuthor

Instagram https://www.instagram.com/charlottewhitney65/

LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/charlotte-whitney-8235463a/

Twitter https://twitter.com/CWhitneyAuthor

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