Literary Fiction · DarkA respected storekeeper and loan shark in a small Georgia town kills a young Black girl over a debt
Paris Trout
by Pete Dexter
A respected store owner in a Georgia town is arrested for a killing and goes to trial
Paris Trout owns a general store and other property in Cotton Point, Georgia, and he is a respected figure in the town. He is also violent and abusive, and after the war he runs a loan-shark operation from his store, preying on struggling Black families. While collecting a debt from a young man, Trout and an accomplice kill a young Black girl, Rosie Sayers, and seriously injure a Black woman. Trout is arrested, and a trial is set that will change the town.
More about this book
Who
Paris Trout, a racist store owner, his wife, whom he abuses, and the girl Rosie Sayers. A lawyer named Harry Seagraves takes part in the trial.
World
Cotton Point, a small town in Georgia, around the end of World War II.
What makes it different
The crime comes early, and the book is about what follows in the town and in Trout's home.
Feel
Dark and unsparing. It won the 1988 National Book Award for Fiction and was made into a TV film.
Page count and cover shown for: Selected edition
Further reading
- Paris TroutWikipedia