SOURCE: "Louisiana Justice," in Los Angeles Times Book Review, May 30, 1993, p. 11.

[In the following review of A Lesson before Dying, Swindle calls the story "enormously moving," but faults the novel's pace and dialogue.]

One fall afternoon in rural south Louisiana in the late 1940s, a slow-witted young black man called Jefferson accepts a ride from two ne'er-do-wells, Brother and Bear. In the scene that serves as catalyst for Ernest Gaines' eighth novel, A Lesson Before Dying, Brother and Bear decide to detour by Alcee Grope's store to try to obtain a pint of wine on credit. When they are refused their request, guns are produced; two black men and the white grocer are left dead on the floor.

In a state of panic, Jefferson swills a half bottle of whiskey and pockets the money from the open cash drawer. Before he can flee, two white men enter the...