July 2000

The House of Gentle Men by Kathy Hepinstall

     In her first novel, Kathy Hepinstall masterfully considers the tentative negotiations required in the relationships of men and women. Set in the backwoods and swamps of Louisiana, her characters embrace living courageously even after enduring extreme hardship. As the title suggests, the central action of the novel takes place around a household made up of mostly men-- men who are "gentle." The idea for this interesting congregation of males came to Mr. Olen, the proprietor of this establishment, after his wife left him for another man. Olen believed that his wife, Janey, would have stayed with him and their children, Louise and Benjamin, if he had only been kinder to her, noticed the work she did around the house, and been more present for her emotionally. After he discovers her whereabouts with her new lover and tries fruitlessly to get her to return home, he relocates the remnants of his family to Louisiana and opens a house where women will be treated with the kindness and gentleness his wife deserved. In a final letter to Janey, Olen tells her of his new business. The women from the neighboring town arrive each night with a bit of money in their pockets and are allowed to pick two characteristics that they wish to have in the man with whom they will spend the evening. It is Olen's hope that his wife will return to him when she understands his penance.

     At first description, this house in the swamps sounds like a typical brothel with women as customers instead of the more usual men, but the secrets of this house go deeper than a barter for intercourse. Each of the men working in the house has committed some crime against the female gender and on beginning his work there, been asked by Olen to describe his sin. Olen carefully records each session and keeps files on each man in a safe in the cellar. As far as the "work" goes, intercourse is strictly forbidden. The women are instead caressed and affectionately fondled; the men follow the instructions of their customers at all times. No women are allowed to stay in the house until sunrise, and as they leave before morning they drop a donation in a syrup can that is placed by the door. None of the men are to be given money directly, and the syrup can fund goes towards house expenses.

     Louise and Benjamin have grown up in this strange house, never spoken of aloud in the region, and each child has found a different way of dealing with the lose of their mother and the peculiar way in which their father continues to try to win her back. Louise is a frantic and neurotic house cleaner, spending her time scouring and disinfecting. She even goes out into the woods each week and chooses a tree to wash from top to bottom. The house of gentle men is fresh-smelling and meticulously neat. Benjamin, on the other hand, has found his niche in this community by coaxing the women on their way out of the house into his shed in the backyard. Continually badgering the men for their soft manners, he preys on the soothed women convincing them to try a "real" man. Once he has had them, Benjamin wastes no time in asking them to leave so that often women are found after dawn crying in the surrounding woods.

     On the periphery of this strange house lives an altogether different family, though similarly torn by heartache over the years. Charlotte and her brother Milo are a strange and solemn pair. Milo was fascinated with fire from a very young age and inadvertently caused the death of his mother in a fire he set in a shed in the backyard. Charlotte carries with her the secret of a rape by three soldiers one hot day in the swamp during the Louisiana Maneuvers of World War II and the resulting child that she gave birth to and left in the woods. Following the incident, Charlotte gave up speaking and communicates with the world by writing on a pad. Charlotte's silence elicits anger in Milo. He is not sure what happened the day that his sister went walking and returned with torn and dirty clothes, but following on the heels of his mother's death he feels the need to take action. He is sure that his sister's silence is in some way connected to the soldiers who are moving through town. So, he sets a portion of their base ablaze and is branded an arsonist. Although the community felt sympathy for him after the death of his mother and largely assumed that the incident was an accident, doubt is cast on Milo's innocence after he is caught setting this second fire.

     These two families are connected by the child that Charlotte left to die on a tree stump in the middle of the forest. That day, Louise was out in the woods trying to pick a tree to scrub when she came upon the child and took it for her own. Charlotte has no idea that her baby has survived, and it is into this charged situation that Justin walks. A young soldier back from the war, he arrives at the house of gentle men determined to take his own life because of the atrocity that he committed during the Louisiana Maneuvers before the war-the rape of a young girl.

     With all actors in place, Hepinstall slowly moves them through the external motions of living as their internal and private stories unfold. How does a man atone for rape? How can a silent woman forgive herself for the decision to kill a helpless child? How does a husband convince his wife that he has changed? How can a daughter and son manage the loss of a mother to her lover and a father to her memory? Are there any fulfilling relationships between men and women? Must they exclude or include intercourse? What is the true meaning of grace?

     As she explores these questions, Hepinstall invites the reader to visit the lush landscape of southwestern Louisiana. In each new scene, the characters are first made a part of their surroundings. In terse prose, the author conveys a sense of place and a sense of person. Scenes of violence and tender passion are juxtaposed, revealing similar resonance. In some of the most dramatic situations of the novel, Hepinstall is sparsest in her descriptions, leaving her prose nearly devoid of authorial intrusion. Her approach in posing questions which explore the nature of humanity does not lend itself to didactic conclusions, but to further probing. In the end, the novel is much more than its three hundred odd pages.