Poor Mrs. Rigsby
Kathy Herman
Multnomah, Jul 2004, $12.99, 320 pp.
ISBN: 1590523148

Angry with Sam since he divorced her after three decades of marriage to move in with a younger chick, leaving her with a run down house and two teens, Certified Nurse Assistant Sally Cox also hates her work at the Walnut Hills Nursing Center. She detests the patients and the staff though she likes nonagenarian dementia victim Elsie Rigsby even when the elderly woman loses her touch with reality.

During a seemingly lucid moment, Mrs. Rigsby informs Sally that she has stashed away from her avaricious family a fraudulent fortune. She wants Sally to distribute the money to worthy people in need. Sally promises to do so, but the temptation to use the money to get out of her own debt is overwhelming. Yet her conscience tells her to do the good deed and trust that God will take care of her woes though with the setbacks in her personal life, Sally has lost faith. Which path will she take especially when a snake offers her the easy road?

Although some readers will believe that the POOR MRS. RIGSBY is a naive look at money, Kathy Herman provides a deep character study that focuses on faith and greed. The story line follows Sally as she feels like a failed female Job with a temptation that could solve much of her woes. Ms. Herman makes a case in an age of fiscal abuse and irresponsibility by those in power in Wall St and DC that money is not the root of evil; spinning the NRA contention that "guns don't kill, people kill", people's attitude turns money into a weapon of destruction.

Harriet Klausner