Detailed plot synopsis reviews of The Daughter of Union County |
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With Henry dead, Jebediah expects Margaret to inherit and expects he will manage her money.
But when the will is read, Jebediah gets some surprises. In the will Henry's wife, Bertha, gets a stipend. But so do some of his servants; Salome gets $5000 a year, which is a lot of money for a hundred years ago. As for the estate, a third goes to Bertha, but Jebediah is forbidden to touch her money. Another third goes to Waylon, and the last third to Tom-Tom, all of Henry's bastard children.
Jebediah is further enraged when he is told that he will be given a stipend but if he challenges the will the stipend will be cut. He realizes he has effectively been cut out of the will and is very upset about this. He is also upset that two black people, Waylon and Tom-Tom, got 2/3 of the inheritance. Waylon is even allowed to call himself the "Duke".
Click here to see the rest of this reviewWith Hardin dead, Maxwell Joe, a black servant who had admired Salome all during the decades when Hardin had been boning her, finally marries Salome. She's just a bit slightly used, heh heh.
Oil is discovered on the farm. Jebediah hires a KKK guy named Gopher to drill for it. Yes, his name is really Gopher. Remember Gomer Pyle from the Andy Griffith show? Imagine an evil KKK version of Gomer Pyle and you will have Gopher.
Gopher wants Tom-Tom and Waylon to sign away their rights to the oil and tries to intimidate them. He tries to run over Waylon in a car and burns a cross outside his home. Assisting Gopher in these tasks is Morris. Morris is Margaret's son who does not realize he is part black nor that Waylon and Tom-Tom are really his uncles. Morris hates black people, not realizing he is one himself.
Margaret, worried that Waylon and Tom-Tom will be killed by Jebediah's KKK friends like Gopher, allows Jebediah to bone her whenever he likes. Previously he was limited to four times a year. But now Margaret even pretends to enjoy the sex like a real whore. But Jebediah isn't that dumb. He realizes Margaret is whoring herself out to protect the others and he laughs at her.
Salome becomes retarded or goes into a coma or something. Maxwell Joe cures her by boning her. Really. "She let her eyes drift close as Maxwell Joe pumped the joy of living back into her." He pumped her with the joy of living... I can't stop laughing as I type this!!!!
Morris throws Tom-Tom off a train, killing him. I mean, Morris denies throwing Tom-Tom off the train. He said Tom-Tom fell off by accident, heh heh, while Morris was trying to persuade Tom-Tom to sign over the oil rights to his land. Then Waylon's daughter gets kidnapped. Maybe she gets kidnapped by accident too, heh heh.
Margaret tells Morris that (a) he's really black and (b) he's a rape baby. Morris doesn't take the news well. He starts vomiting. Then he says "that makes me a bastard and you a whore." Then Morris gets drunk and has to be locked in an insane asylum.
Gopher shows up with some KKK guys with rifles. Margaret and Waylon decide to sell their interest in the oil. The KKK guys win and get all the oil. In an afterwards many years later, Margaret and Waylon talk about how happy they are.
What the f????
The end.
Literary Criticism:
This book was Game of Thrones on a farm in Arkansas. Really.
1) All the characters hated each other.
2) The characters all tried to humiliate and belittle each other constantly.
3) The characters were constantly bribing, blackmailing, and intimidating each other to get power.
That's Game of Thrones. It just happens to take place on a farm in Arkansas.
The character conflict was very dramatic and mostly very well written. Most books focus on one or two main characters where very little happens. This book had at least a half dozen main characters with a lot of conflict between them. It didn't feel like the story dragged, except at the end.
Not only that, but the author had an amazing ability to draw a scene--like when Bertha was tied to the bed and James's wife discovered her--that is very dramatic and funny at the same time.
But the book was not perfect, for a number of reasons. Here are just a few. The latter part with Sylvester getting campaign contributions from Hardin made no sense. His weird death hanging upside down from a tree for sexual purposes made no sense.
And the ending was a complete letdown. Margaret is a rich lady. She's inherited from her father and controls her husband. Suddenly, she lets a bunch of KKK guys intimidate her. She's so intimidated that she lets her husband bone her whenever he likes and pretends to enjoy it like a whore. This is totally unbelievable.
What could a woman with money do to protect herself?
1) Hire a lot of guards.
2) Hire a lot of guards with guns.
3) Have a lot of guards with guns shoot the KKK.
Margaret certainly had the money to do these things, but didn't. Instead she and Waylon surrendered to the KKK and had a weird kind of 30 years later happy ending where they all reflect how happy they are. Well, no, they aren't so happy because they let themselves be intimidated out of their land and money. With most of the book spent watching characters blackmail and intimidate each other, I fully expected Margaret and Waylon to fight the same way. They didn't, and collapsed like a wet taco. What a disappointing ending.
