James Nicoll Reviews

Joan Samson’s 1975 The Auctioneer is a stand-alone social horror novel.

Although they do not suspect it, John and Mim Moore’s life is doomed as soon as local cop Bob Gore arrives with news and a request. An out-of-towner named Perly Dunsmore has bought the Fawkes farm. A former small-town boy himself, Perly has plans for Harlow, New Hampshire. Step one, an auction of donated goods, over which experienced auctioneer Perly will preside.

The bumpkins of backwoods Harlow, New Hampshire are content with their lot and/or fearful of change. However, the outside world insists on encroaching on their bucolic isolation. Indeed, the Fawkes place was available for purchase because its previous owner was strangled to death by persons unknown. The town clearly needs more law and order than one cop who won’t even wear his uniform. Thus the auction to fund the hiring of deputies.

Hiring the deputies leads to ongoing expenses. Solution? More auctions. The good people of Harlow become accustomed to the weekly arrival of the auction truck to collect more items to sell. Somehow, though, polite requests become thinly veiled demands. Then they are simply demands.

Like most residents, John and Mim don’t have much. Nevertheless, Perly and his army of deputies are content to confiscate it all, piece by piece. Once the family’s inanimate possessions are auctioned off, including the firearms, next is the livestock. Of course, Perly won’t stop there. He hasn’t yet acquired the locals’ most precious possessions.

City folk are eager to leave the troubled cities behind for country life. Every house and farm is money in Perly’s pocket, provided only the inhabitants can be convinced to move away. With an army of armed deputies eager to obey orders and suggestions, prudent locals see the sense in packing up what little remains to them and fleeing the county before they too suffer unfortunate, life-altering accidents.

Childless couples frustrated with the formal adoption process find salvation in Harlow. Perly is just as adept at separating parents from their children as he was at confiscating their possessions. A white child of pure stock [1] commands top dollar from desperate adults. While the money flows into Perly’s bank account, everyone gains: impoverished parents have fewer mouths to feed, childless couples gain children, and the children themselves have better lives than they could have had in Harlow. At least, so Perly says.

John and Mim fear Perly will sell their daughter Hildie. John is too stubborn to leave. He is too ignorant and inarticulate to convince the state to intervene, even if New Hampshire weren’t inclined to see Perly as Harlow’s visionary savior. That leaves only the one thing John is good at: brute violence, carried out in the dark of night. 

~oOo~

Did Perly murder Amelia Fawkes to get his hands on her house or did he simply take advantage of an opportunity? Either seems possible. Likewise, Perly may have targeted Harlow because it represents the chance to get revenge on the stultifying small-town life to which he was subjected as a boy. It may simply be that Perly’s grasp of small-town psychology makes Harlow an easy target for him.

One might expect the protagonist in a psychological horror novel to be sympathetic. That’s not the case with John, who pestered his wife Mim into sex and then marriage when she was fifteen, who off-handedly bullies her now to ensure compliance. John’s not a nice guy. He’s also not decisive, well-informed, or smart, which handicaps him considerably in his struggle with charming, cunning Perly.

Along those lines, author Samson does not paint an especially appealing picture of rural life. Many modern conveniences are unknown in this modern Dogpatch. Generally speaking, folks are poor. Many are subsistence farmers. Farmer’s wives like Mim grow old while still young in years.

Nevertheless, as Samson demonstrates, it is possible for bad to get worse. John might be a brute and rapist; Perly might be a murderer, he certainly orders violence, and he sells humans. Unusually for a horror novel, there’s no hint of supernatural means. All Perly needed was charm and control of the local law enforcement. Once he had that, there was not much the locals could do to resist him.

Although the ending feels rushed and unconvincing, the rest of the novel is an effective tale of a glib developer victimizing a naive community. One could easily image the tale happening today.

Samson died aged thirty-eight in 1976. The Auctioneer was Samson’s only novel.

The Auctioneer may be purchased here (Amazon US), here (Amazon Canada), here (Amazon UK), here (Apple Books), here (Barnes & Noble), here (Kobo), and here (Words Worth Books).

I could not find The Auctioneer at troubled Chapters-Indigo.

1: Perly’s sale pitch when he sells the kids is just as racist as it sounds.