Hattiesburg author and Liberty native Dr. Jim Robertson has continued his novels set in Amite County with “Abandoned,” he told an audience at a Magnolia Library luncheon Thursday.
Robertson, 77, was blinded at age 20 in an automobile accident, a story he told in his autobiography, “Beyond Darkness.”
It took years to recover, but he went on to get a Ph.D and teach 25 years at the University of Southern Mississippi and 10 at Northeast Texas Community College before retiring to Hattiesburg with his wife Linda. He later became executive director of Habitat for Humanity and has written several books.
After “Beyond Darkness,” Robertson wrote a trilogy of novels set in Amite County.
“Jimmy’s Hope” tells what happened when a 23-year-old white man who teaches school finds a basket containing a black baby at his doorstep.
“Sweet Alice” is told through the eyes of a young black woman.
And “Jay Stevens” ends the trilogy with a character based in part on Robertson’s best friend, the late James Stevenson of Liberty.
The newest novel, “Abandoned,” has a character named for another friend of his, Pike County resident Nic Fitzgerald.
“He and I go back to 1961 together,” Robertson said.
The novel tells the story of a character named Ben Wilkie, who graduates from Liberty High School at the top of his class in 1957 and falls for an older woman named Frankie Johansson — only to have her leave town abruptly after she receives a strange phone call.
Robertson said he had always wanted to be a writer and was especially inspired by Mark Twain. One morning in April 2002 the plot to “Jimmy’s Hope” suddenly came to him.
“Within 10 minutes of the time I had the first idea, I had the whole book in my head,” Robertson said. “It took two years to get it out.”
Robertson and his wife Linda have two children and two grandchildren. His sister, Linda Carruth of Magnolia, introduced him to the library audience.
