Set in small town North Carolina in the 1970s, Decent People is a amateur sleuth mystery novel where the characters sit at other's kitchen tables and discuss who murdered a local doctor and her two siblings. Jo Wright, who has moved back to the community from New York City, takes it on herself to defend soon-to-be husband number three who is accused of being involved in the murder. The novel rings with community and culture and it is recommended for readers who enjoy a strong sense of place

I’m not much of a crime fan, so wasn’t expecting to enjoy this, once I realized it revolved around a triple murder. But it isn’t a conventional crime novel, and is all the more enjoyable for it. Instead, it’s a slice of small town life, set in North Carolina in the 1970s where mixed race involvement is still violently discouraged and the KKK still survives, though with a lower profile. It’s a rich tale of community, particularly focused on its female members, and cleverly low key, while discussing major issues, not just race but homosexuality and relationships. Winslow is a deceptive writer, comical as well as serious, and deft. The novel is a bit of a dark horse and deserves attention.

I was pleased to include this title in the 2023 Summer Reading Roundup for The Bitter Southerner: https://bittersoutherner.com/feature/2023/summer-reading-roundup-2023

A beautiful and important book about a tough topic from an author who continues to impress. For fans of his first book and new fans alike, Winslow continues to build his literary repertoire.

I was looking forward to reading this book, never having read anything by the author. Jo Wright has moved back to her segregated southern town of West Mills, she is engaged to Lymp and is looking forward to making a life with him. A triple murder is committed in town-a Black pediatrician and her sister and brother. They happen to be the half siblings of Lymp who is brought in for questioning. The police are content to call it a drug related murder, but the small town looks accusingly at Lymp. Jo starts her own investigation. The plot is a bit wobbly and the conclusion not quite satisfying, but the author has done a fine job of portraying a small Southern town, divided on racial lines.

Decent People was intriguing but sort of lost me in the middle. The story is interesting, and I might have to give it another read. I had too many things going to concentrate on the plot. I really like Jo's character and wonder if there might be a sequel or series with her. If that is the case, I will be reading that book.

This book is set in the same small North Carolina town as the author’s “West Mills”, but it does not appear to be a sequel. Although I own a copy of “West Mills” I have not read it, and I’m not sure that I ever will. In this book the siblings Marian, Marva and Lazarus Harmon are murdered in their home shortly after Jo Wright has returned to her home town from New York City. Jo is planning to marry Olympus “Lymp” Seymore, the half brother of the Harmons. Lymp immediately comes under suspicion because of his estrangement from the victims and his recent argument with one of them. Since the police don’t seem very interested in solving the murder of a Black family, Jo begins to investigate.

This book is not really a murder mystery. The murder is just an excuse for the revelation of numerous instances of racism, homophobia and hypocrisy in West Mills. Why anyone would want to return to this stultifying town after having escaped it is beyond my comprehension. Jo’s investigation consists of her asking a lot of questions. There are several suspects, but they are all eliminated. Marva and Lazarus were somewhat strange, but had no enemies. It turns out that the pediatrician Marian was a money-grubbing wicked witch of the west and pretty much everyone who encountered her would want to murder her. However, West Mills is not a hotbed of violence, and the resolution of the crime really came out of nowhere. So, the mystery wasn’t very satisfying and I did not find the characters compelling. 3 stars

I received a free copy of this book from the publisher.

Atlanta Journal-Constitution review:
Interconnected family secrets, a whodunit murder mystery and the unshakable remnants of
bigotry spin North Carolina author De’Shawn Charles Winslow’s second novel “Decent People”
into an introspective and big-hearted examination of small-town Southern life. Returning to the
setting of his 2019 debut “In West Mills,” Winslow’s standalone work “Decent People” picks up
in 1976 when West Mills’ first Black doctor is murdered, along with her two siblings, and
follows three women who possess vastly different interests in the case.

Josephine “Jo” Wright left West Mills as a girl. Now retired, she’s returning to marry her old
schoolmate Olympus “Lymp” Seymore. Jo is shocked when Lymp is named a suspect in the
cold-blooded murders of his three half-siblings and sets out on a mission to clear her fiancé’s
name. She discovers that Eunice Manning Loving, a character Winslow resurrects from “In West
Mills,” had an altercation with Dr. Marian Harmon shortly before her death. Further
investigation reveals that Savannah Temple Russet, a white widow shunned by her family for her
interracial marriage, also threatened one of the dead siblings. And her father who owns property
the doctor was leasing had words with her as well...

See THE ATLANTA JOURNAL-CONSTITUTION for the full review: https://www.ajc.com/life/arts-culture/decent-people-grapples-with-a-small-southern-towns-changing-mores/L6B66NP4QFAZVPLXO6J2EIQEUI/

I was reminded of Agatha Christie’s Miss Marple or Angela Lansbury in Murder She Wrote while reading this delightful novel.
Jo returns to her hometown to retire and is immediately thrown into the case of possible murder charges against her fiancé.
She talks to a variety of townspeople learning the secrets they all have.
Eventually the culprit is caught.
Lovely story, great writing. Enjoyed every minute.
Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for allowing me this ARC.

"#DecentPeople" is a terrific read! My first novel by Mr. Winslow, but I'll be visiting his first novel "In West Mills". I loved these characters - their hubris, their passion, their confusion and their secrets. Just good people trying to do the right thing, however subjective their "right" might be (I'm talking to you, Eunice!). Heartbreaking to see how they try to live within the confines thrust upon them by 1960s society, yet these folks do a great job of maintaining their humanity despite such huge odds. The white folks, not so much. They appear to be looking out for #1, and only #1. Sigh. Heavy, heavy sigh.

All said, an excellent book, highly recommend.

P.S. Thanks to #netgalley for the ARC.

Everyone, it appears, has reason to kill the Harmons. It would have been nice for them to have at least one redeeming quality so that the reader actually cares who did it and why.

“Big gossip in a small town”
This quote describes this novel perfectly. Jo is looking forward to retirement and marrying her rekindled love. A triple murder halts those plans when her intended is accused of murdering his half siblings. Jo takes on the job of finding the real killer. She is 95% sure her intended didn't do it. There are several others that had motive and we are introduced to them all. This author is excellent at character development and pulls you in to their stories. The mystery stays hidden but I figured it out about 80% in. I highly recommend this book and look forward to more from this author.

****Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing an ARC in exchange for my honest review****

It’s 1976 in the still-segregated town of West Mills N Carolina, and two sisters and a brother are found shot to death in their home. Their half-brother Olympus (Lymp) is the main suspect having been heard just days before threatening to kill them. He is taken into police custody but, without enough evidence, he is released but many in the town still think he’s the culprit. His fiance, Josephine Wright isn’t altogether sure of his innocence herself but is determined to find out the truth and there are plenty of others who were seen having heated words with the sisters just prior to the murders.

Decent People is the second book by De’Shawn Charles Winslow but it works quite well as a standalone. It is at once a compelling mystery and an interesting portrait of race, class, and family in the ‘70s American south. The story is divided between various povs but it is easy to keep them separate. A well-written, well-plotted tale that grabbed me from the first page and kept my interest throughout.

<i>Thanks to Netgalley and Bloomsbury USA for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review</i>

Published by Bloomsbury Publishing on January 17, 2023

Decent People is a novel of small-town secrets and southern bigotry. In 1976, black and white people mix uneasily in the North Carolina town of West Mills, but everyone understands that there is a black side of town and a white side of town.

As a white widow with black children, Savannah Temple Russet is not accepted in either side. Savannah has been estranged from her racist parents since she decided to marry a black man. Savannah’s mother is particularly vile. Savannah’s best friend is Marva Harmon, whose sister Marian is the town’s first black doctor.

Savannah and Marva are keeping a secret — their addiction to Valium and the source of their pills. Savannah’s father, who owns the shopping center in which Marian rents space for a pediatric clinic, has a secret that reveals his small-town hypocrisy.

Josephine Wright spent most of her life in New York, where her brother Hershel was able to be open about his sexuality. After returning to West Mills, Jo learns that Hershel was keeping a secret about why their mother decided to move north.

A family secret was kept from Fran Waters and Eunice Manning until 1960, when they were in their late teens. At that point, the girls became rivals for a farmhand named Breezy Loving. He took advantage of the situation and enjoyed the company of both girls. The secret that the girls will only learn later in life adds to the soap opera of their triangular relationship.

Eunice and Breezy are married when the novel begins. They have a son named La’Roy. Concerned that her son is too effeminate, Eunice takes La’Roy to Marian Harmon in the hope that a doctor will know what to do. Eunice expects Marian to talk to La’Roy, but Marian tries to persuade Savannah’s sons to beat the gay out of La’Roy. Savannah does not appreciate the attempt to turn her children into thugs, even if they are already bullies. Confrontations with both Marian and Marva ensue.

Much of this is backstory suggests that Decent People will be a novel of melodramatic scandal. The novel threatens to cross that line, but the secrets take on new importance after Marian, her sister Marva, and their brother Lazarus are murdered. Marva was Marian’s assistant; Laz was her driver and cleaner.

Savannah and Eunice are both murder suspects because Eunice confronted Marian and Savannah confronted both women, although neither Eunice nor Savannah want to admit that the confrontation concerned Marian’s attempt to “treat” La’Roy by persuading Savannah’s sons to beat him. Savannah’s father Ted is a suspect because he was seen arguing with Marian for reasons he also chooses to conceal. Jo’s fiancé, Lymp Seymore, is a suspect because he made nasty statements about the Harmons in public.

Jo is angry that of all the suspects, Lymp is the only one who was taken into custody for questioning. She conducts her own investigation because she’s convinced the police don’t care who murdered three black people. She’s right that the police aren’t making much of an effort to solve the murders. They blame it on the usual suspects — unidentified “folk from up North” — and chalk it up to a drug deal gone bad because pills were found at the murder scene. But why would drug dealers leave drugs behind?

The novel isn’t a whodunit. Most of the story has passed before a reader has enough information to make an educated guess about the killer’s identity. In hindsight, the clues are there, but I didn’t solve the mystery on my own. Nor is the killer’s identity particularly important to the story. The reveal is almost an afterthought.

This is instead a novel about characters concealing truths in the hope that they can live relatively decent lives, free from judgment and hypocrisy, lives that are not defined by small-town scandals and the prejudices that are passed from generation to generation. It is the story of a gossipy town in which secrets will out. As Eunice observes, “nothing stays secret for long in West Mills.”

De'Shawn Charles Winslow tells the story in quietly understated prose. He creates lives in full. It's good to give characters flesh, but some of the backstories stray from the essential. One that comes in the novel’s second half bogs down the story for a bit. For the most part, however, the story moves at a good pace as it shifts its focus among the key players.

The novel fails to generate the emotional intensity one might expect from a book based on a triple homicide and attempted child abuse, perhaps because its tragedies come across as representative rather than personal. Marian’s desire to punish La’Roy for effeminate mannerisms might best be seen as a stand-in for all vicious intolerance, rather than a convincing response to Eunice’s request for help.

The novel’s strongest moment comes at the end, when Savannah realizes that her reliance on pills (which never seems to have a negative impact on her life) causes her to lose credibility with her children. I’m not sure Eunice ever gains comparable insight into the much greater harm she does by failing to accept her son for who he is. Still, that’s an honest portrayal of life. Some parents make progress and others don’t.

Novels that spotlight the evils plaguing small towns are a literary staple. Maybe the targets of the spotlight are too easy to hit. Yet Decent People is an admirable attempt to remind readers that racism and homophobia are accepted by supposedly “decent people” in too much of the nation, particularly in towns where like-minded people allow bigotry to thrive.

RECOMMENDED

Loved this so much. Location was great, time period was perfect. The black experience was told so well. Really loved the characters.

A triple homicide in the fictional town of West Mills, North Carolina sets the scene for De’Shawn Charles Winslow’s second novel, Decent People.

If West Mills might sound familiar, it’s because Winslow’s first novel, In West Mills, was listed for—and won—numerous literary prizes in 2019.

Although his newest release uses the same setting, it’s a completely new story that doesn’t require having read In West Mills.

I recently spoke with De’Shawn Charles Winslow about the fictional town, some of the surprises he found when writing the mystery, and how readers might recognize some of their own biases.

In "Decent People," De'Shawn Charles Winslow modernizes the Agatha Christie template by setting a whodunnit in 1970’s North Carolina. Following the murder of a Black paediatrician and her siblings our protagonist, Jo, works through the bevy of suspects to find the killer. A virtuoso novel blending the twisty thrills of a mystery with an exploration of race and class. A must read!

Character-driven, drawn-out like like the slow burn of smoldering embers, and with all of the grit of that you'd imagine from a novel centering 1970s small-town North Carolina and the people in it's fold, Decent People was a novel that both captivated me and made me wish I had any sway at all in what HBO was picking up as series these days. This book was both dramatic and tame in the same breath.
This is a mystery, but it goes deeper, with themes like race, class, and homophobia explored (but not explained, which is an important distinction). I thought the mystery was compelling throughout. My one complaint is that the pacing of the ending felt abrupt, which didn't seem to match the tone that the author established for the story in the beginning.
Overall, a knockout of a novel.

A very layered book looking into the depths and dark of our world. I was really emotional reading the narratives of these characters, and how they have all had to hide parts of themselves because of their own community. I feel this book is an important and relevant read about truths in our world and the systems still being upheld now. Especially recommended for “Allies”.

I really wanted to love this one, but unfortunately I found the writing to be a little too simplistic, and the characters felt a bit one-dimensional.