Catherine Carmier Book

By the author of A Lesson Before Dying and The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman, Catherine Carmier is a compelling love story set in a deceptively bucolic Louisiana countryside, where blacks, Cajuns, and whites maintain an uneasy coexistence.

After living in San Francisco for ten years, Jackson returns home to his benefactor, Aunt Charlotte. Surrounded by family and old friends, he discovers that his bonds to them have been irreparably rent by his absence. In the midst of his alienation from those around him, he falls in love with Catherine Carmier, setting the stage for conflicts and confrontations which are complex, tortuous, and universal in their implications.

By the author of A Gathering of Old Men and The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman, this is a compelling love story set in a deceptively bucolic Louisiana countryside, where African Americans, Cajuns, and whites maintain an uneasy coexistence. "(Gaines') best writing is marked by what Ralph Ellison, describing the blues, called 'near-tragic, near-comic lyricism."--Newsweek.