THE POOR AND THE HAUNTED

A novel examines the impact of a father’s suicide on his son.

Jimmy Lansford had a hard childhood in rural Oklahoma, but he seems to have come out well. He has a well-paying job and he and his wife, Jill, and their children, Jonathan and Jessica, live in an upper-class neighborhood near Phoenix. Yet Jimmy is a haunted man, scarred by his past. His father, Ronnie, killed himself when Jimmy was 15 years old and his sister, Kelly, was 12. They were left living with their meth addict mother until Jimmy escaped to college. It’s slowly revealed that Kelly wasn’t as lucky. Strange things start to happen to Jimmy when Jessica is about to turn 12. First, on a business trip, he spies someone in his room through a window, but there’s no trace of anyone there when he races back. Then, at Jessica’s birthday party, he senses a presence with him in his bathroom. Jimmy reaches his breaking point when he finds muddy, inexplicable footprints in his bedroom. This leads the former cross-country star to sneak out his bedroom window and nearly run himself to death, ending up hospitalized with dehydration. Jimmy thinks he’s possessed. Those around him want to chalk up his behavior to survivor’s guilt. The truth lies somewhere in between. McKissen (The Civil War at Home, 2018) paints a well-conceived portrait of a troubled man, utilizing Jimmy’s journey through life. The author cleverly alternates between the present and Jimmy’s formative years, slowly unreeling the protagonist’s past so that readers can understand why such a good man is struggling despite his circumstances. Kelly hangs over the entire tale, as Jimmy blames himself for her tragic fate, thinking his departure ultimately doomed her. His intriguing backstory is a tale of missed opportunities. Things would have been different if Jimmy had been willing to reach out more fervently to Mike Carlisle, the cop who had taken an interest in the Lansford siblings after Ronnie’s suicide. The effective ending involves Jimmy's informing his family about the hurt he’s carried all these years.

This thought-provoking tale makes a strong argument for letting go of past pain.