Plunder Room by John Jeter

From the Publisher

Moments before Edward Duncan dies, the colorful World War II hero leaves a mandate for his grandson Randol--to safeguard the family's proud Southern legacy. Randol, paralyzed and in a wheelchair after a car accident, buries his grandfather, and learns that his father, a Vietnam veteran, is running an illicit empire with Randol's half-brother, Jerod.

A wise-cracking music critic, Randol already has his hands full with his pot-smoking Goth son. When Jerod brings the gorgeous Annie down South and parks her in their South Carolina home, the family maid Volusia, "quick to ram a bar of soap into any foul mouth," sizes up Annie in short order. Jerod, his father, and Randol, are blind to what Volusia sees so easily, making it that much harder for Randol to bring the family together and salvage their dignity.

John Jeter's debut is a powerfully compelling story about one man's mission to preserve his family's ideals of honor and loyalty.

Publishers Weekly

War, secrets and father-son dynamics haunt a South Carolina family estate in Jeter's middling debut. The novel's wheelchair-bound narrator, Randol Duncan, seeks to unlock his grandfather's war chest, or Plunder Room, at the top of a steep staircase. While Randol's desire develops, present-day problems crash into the old house: his half-brother, Jerod, arrives with a gorgeous Yankee whose "azure eyes dance like Fred and Ginger" and who sparks frequent controversy. And while Randol and his son, Eddie, may share some laughs over family hijinks and an interest in rock music, the boy's teenage rebellion swoops from the use of "guyliner" to resisting his father's wish that he date a girl from school. But the big news that shocks Randol has to do with the true nature of his father's business. Add in a mysterious African-American caller and an Internet sex scandal, and you've got an overplotted tangle that builds toward a thin anticlimax. Randol is engaging enough as a narrator, but the story he tells is a letdown. (Jan.)

Thomas L. Kilpatrick - Library Journal

The Duncan family of South Carolina has a legacy of service, valor, and honor reaching back to the Revolutionary War. From his deathbed, Col. Edward Duncan passes responsibility for continuing that legacy to his eldest grandson, Randol. But the prospects look bleak; Randol is a paraplegic, and his father and younger brother have thumbed their noses at tradition and parlayed family connections and military service into a fortune based on drugs and other disreputable activities. Focusing on his 14-year-old son, Randol works around other family members until a crisis demands full disclosure and family unity. With sharp wit and a scandalous story, Jeter exposes the Southern family tradition with all its pride and disappointments, secrets and sophistication, strength and resiliency, and invites everyone in to view the innermost workings. This first novel is strongly recommended for public libraries, especially those below the Mason-Dixon Line.

Product Details