THE PEOPLE FROM HEAVEN

With rough humor, anger and considerable compassion -- this is the story of the people of heaven, the American indigenes who under the hypocrisy of virtue practised all kinds of private vices (adultery and incest and so on), lived in bigotry and self righteousness and directed their vindictiveness against the Jews and the Negro and the Indian. Here is Warrensburg, with ""only a screen-door between it and Hell's backside"" shown through annals of old Doc Slocum, this is a story of crisis precipitated by a Negress, America Smith, who came to town and was taken in by the pastor, of their persecution which culminated in her rape by the leading vilifier, and of her retribution -- through his murder. Compared with Caldwell's finess in handling such themes, this seems brutal, raw, but there is an occasional elegiac quality which provides a counterpoint he lacks.