???? UNDER THE LAMPLIGHT-

99% true and 1% exaggeration: That’s how John Berendt described his lineup of eccentric characters in his 1994 novel, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. Retelling Berendt’s own time spent living in Savannah, Georgia, we meet entertainer The Lady Chablis, bankrupt jazz bar owner Joe Odom and chemist Luther Driggers with flies attached to his shirt collar with threads, among others. Savannah’s streets are lined with Spanish-moss draped oaks shadowing the historic houses and their inhabitants, a sleepy and secluded postcard town of the old world. The elitist and largely white society prefers to turn a blind eye to the odd and uncomfortable. But Savannah’s dirty underside comes to light when a member of the elite, Jim Williams, is put on trial for the murder of his lover. Voodoo and midnight graveyard rituals follow in this story of a self-absorbed town populated by a Greek chorus of remarkable characters.