LIBBY HOLMAN: Body and Soul

by Hamilton Darby Perry ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 1, 1983

Not the full-scale biography suggested by the title--but rather (like Perry's A Chair for Wayne Lonergan, 1972) a chatty, rather overextended reconsideration of the evidence in an old crime; here it's the 1932 gunshot-death of young tobacco heir Zachary Smith Reynolds, soon after his marriage to Broadway torch-singer Libby. Perry begins with a keyed-up dramatization of the night-in-question and the immediate aftermath, complete with speculative interior-monologues and exclamation points galore: Smith brought to a Winston-Salem hospital by pal Albert Walker, Libby, and actress Blanche Yurka; the strange disappearance/reappearance of the gun; and the unsure arrival of the local sheriff. (""Jesus! . . . The heat was pressing in and he was beginning to sweat. . . . Why hadn't his boys been told anything earlier? By the hospital, at least!"") Then come fill-in chapters on the Reynolds fortune, Libby's rise to fame, courtship-and-marriage (#2 for young aviator-playboy Smith), and the newlyweds down at ""Reynolda""--with Smith ""incredibly jealous"" and Libby (older, looser) impatient to get back to N.Y. What happened, then, after that drunken party at Reynolda? The Reynolds family--and its mouthpiece/newspaper--declared it was suicide. Libby claimed amnesia about the whole thing. A coroner's jury favored killing by ""person or persons unknown."" That local sheriff, despite powerful opposition, kept sleuthing--and a grand jury soon indicted Libby and Walker for first-degree murder. But then, before a trial could begin, the charges were dropped--after a low-key letter from a family spokesman to the D.A. (Perry hoots: ""In the Reynoldses' company town, that was damn near an ultimatum!"") A deal had apparently been made: in exchange for the dropped charges, Libby would keep quiet about sordid private details--and would accept a very modest share of Smith's multi-million-dollar estate. (The bulk went to a charitable foundation: ""Now the money was finally safe from that crazy Jewish blues singer. . . ."") The D.A., who still believes it was suicide, went along with the deal partly because of the notorious Leo Frank case. (""I didn't want to see Libby get railroaded that way. . . ."") But Perry, in a last-chapter reconstruction, makes clear his belief that drunken/jealous Smith attacked Libby and Walker, the gun went off, and Libby's amnesia was a fake. (Supposedly, unstable Smith was further unhinged by discovering that Libby was Jewish.) A fairly plausible hypothesis--stretched out to somewhat murky book-length with dubious reconstructions, new research, old transcripts, and a sarcastic/cozy style that's half-entertaining, half-irritating.

Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1983

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Little, Brown

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1983

Categories: NONFICTION