Sure, we know what you might be thinking. Maybe it doesn't make any sense to you that, with forty characters to choose from, we decide to take a good long look at a character who doesn't seem to do...

Maybe with a name like Candy, you'd expect her to be sweet. But, if there's one thing that is super-obvious about Candy, it's that she's as tough as a jawbreaker. In fact, she may have actually bro...

We're going to have to put the chuckles on hold for a minute, because there's no joking about Fix Boutan. The father of Beau and Beau's brother Gil, and the undisputed head of the Boutan clan even...

Sometimes, the apple doesn't fall too far from the tree. Other times, it does. When it comes to Gil Boutan, this is one of those other times. One of Fix Boutan's kids, and Beau's little brother, Gi...

Marshall Plantation isn't Mayberry, and you can be sure that Sheriff Mapes is no Andy Griffith. Nope—not by a long shot. We'll give Mapes credit for wanting to get to the bottom of just what went...

The latest of the late arrivals in Gaines's novel, you can honestly say that he's the whole reason everybody else is in the mess that they're in. Charlie, in other words, is the one who actually ki...

Pretty much all of the men who show up at Mathu's place have known each other for their entire lives, so it makes sense that they're comfortable enough with each other to carry on a pretty involved...

In pretty much any group big enough, there's always that one person who kind of belongs but who also kind of doesn't. This is one of those times, and Antoine Christophe—otherwise known as "Dirty...

Like a lot of the other characters in Gaines's novel, we don't know a whole lot about Johnny Paul. We mean, he doesn't even have a cool nickname. But in what is probably the single most powerful an...

Not to be confused with Mathu, Mat is one of the first Marshall residents we meet when we happen upon him hanging out and doing some fishing with his good pal Chimley. It just so happens that Mat's...

Like so many of his pals, Tucker is a character who doesn't say much for most of the novel, but—when Gaines gives him a chance to speak—he shares his own heart-breaking story.  It's all a...

If there's anybody even more useless than Major Jack, it's his wife Beatrice. For starters, while the Major is passed out drunk, Bea—who is seriously absent-minded and should probably be in a nur...