North Carolina-based author RJ McCarthy has just released a new crime novel, Where Seldom is Heard, a fourth for the writer.
Departing from his previous novels in his Tony Quarry/ Carolina Mystery series, Where Seldom is Heard is set on Indian reservations in the Dakotas. Threading through the story is the pathology of crime toward women on an Indian reservation balanced against the complexity of Indian reality that rejects a one-dimensional white notion of reservation life, i.e. casino wealth versus abject poverty. As Rudy Harrier’s moral values collide with his quest for vengeance for the rape of his younger sister, thanks in part to the quiet wisdom of George Wolf Spirit, his maternal grandfather, his awareness of his Indian heritage and his rooted connection to the reservation emerge with increasing clarity.
When Rudy Harrier, a college basketball star, learns that his fifteen-year-old sister, Rose, has been raped, his world turns upside down. Despite the entreaties of his father, a BIA investigator, and his mother, a renowned artisan, Rudy is bent upon avenging his sister. The rapist, Creach Laughing Horse, was considered an “uncle” within the family and therefore trusted.
Raised in New York, RJ McCarthy has lived in the South for fifty years. He received his Ph.D. from the University of South Carolina and worked as a Clinical Psychologist before retiring in 2006 to write full-time.
McCarthy lives with his wife Sue lives in Henderson, North Carolina. He is a member of the Virginia Writer’s Club and the North Carolina Writers Network. Quarry Steps Up was his first published novel. Wilhelmina: An Imagined Memoir, the story of a beloved, African-American woman, was his second publication. Quarry Steps In is the latest in the “Quarry” crime series.
When asked what prompted him to write this story McCarthy said, “What triggered the idea for Where Seldom Is Heard was a Harper’s magazine article (2009 or 2010) by Kathy Dobie, an investigative journalist. She researched the rate of crimes of sexual abuse and violence against women on reservations, found that it was six times the average of similar crimes off-reservation and seldom prosecuted. I was dumbfounded at the stats, not to mention the reality. Though her stats covered reservations in general, as I recall, she concentrated on the Standing Rock Reservation across the North Dakota-South Dakota border. In the book, I do not mention the reservation by name, though it was my model.”
Where Seldom is Heard is available on Amazon in paperback and Kindle as well as Barnes and Noble’s Nook. Learn more of McCarthy’s writing at www.rjmccarthyauthor.com.