Touched

Rating:
Summary: This novel simmers!
Review: Through Ms. Haines' descriptive powers, you can literally feel the heat of 1920's rural Mississippi in this exquisitely suspenseful tale. Racial tension and small-town suspicion simmer beneath supernatural overtones that hang over the tale like the humidity of the deep south.

This story is told from a feminie viewpoint, and I've walked the landscape of Carol Haines'"Jexville" through the memories of my own mother on many occassions. Born in southern Mississippi and raised in the deep south by a woman who lived that time and place, I found humour, insight, compassion, and courage in the characters, and a reality that is perhaps more palatable when wrapped in the threads of mystery and the supernatural.

I loved it!

Rating:
Summary: An intense, engrossing novel with wonderful characters.
Review: Touched is one of the most amazing books I have ever read! From the first page of this book I was drawn into Haines' mysterious, twisted Southern town of Jexville. A constant sense of tension pervades as the story unfolds, petal by petal, and the pages literally begin to turn themselves. The characters are wonderful, endearing people, and the intense relationships they share with one another are multi-dimensional. The twists and turns of the plot would cause me to freak out, then cry, then laugh, all in one chapter. This story gets under your skin in a way that will have you thinking about the characters while you are away from your book. I enjoyed Haines' other book, Summer of the Redeemers, but I thought that Touched was even better. In one word, "intense" best describes Touched. It has been three days since I finished reading it, and the world of Jexville is still in the forefront of my thoughts.