Lovecraft Country

Ruby struggles through Christmas. She is treated badly at her job by both her boss and the clients. She is falsely accused of stealing from a client’s home, so the police search her apartment. After spending Christmas night in a holding cell, she is released. Ruby is angry and embarrassed, even more so when she discovers that she has been fired. She demands her back pay from the two siblings who run the business: Leo reluctantly pays her some of the money she is owed in exchange for keeping quiet about his sister Kathy, whom Ruby believes stole from the client. Returning home, Ruby is sick of being mistreated due to her race.

Ruby searches for a job but finds nothing. She decides to attend Letitia’s New Year’s Eve party. While smoking a cigarette outside, Ruby meets Caleb Braithwhite. She does not know him, but she is attracted to him, so she accepts his invitation to go to a club in a different part of town. They spend the night dancing, talking, and drinking. They bond over their parents, and Ruby explains that her mother was a spiritualist who helped women talk to the dead. Ruby decided not to follow in her mother’s footsteps because she did not like to lie to people. Afterward, Caleb uses magic to stop two muggers and then drives Ruby home, trying to dismiss her questions. He offers her a job, one which involves secrecy. As payment, he will provide the opportunity to “choose your own destiny” (192).

The next morning, Ruby wakes up in the body of a beautiful white woman. After a brief panic, she dresses herself and leaves the unfamiliar house, hailing a cab in the street far quicker than usual. Ruby gives her new identity the name Hillary. When she spots her former boss, Ruby follows Kathy into a department store. Kathy argues with an employee about a cheating boyfriend. Ruby eavesdrops and then slips a scarf into Kathy’s pocket, framing her for theft. Kathy fights back against the policemen and Ruby is suddenly appalled at her own complicitly in the violence.

Distractedly, Ruby walks away and soon finds herself eating lunch with a young white policeman named Mike. She makes up an elaborate backstory for Hillary and is stunned that the policeman sits and listens to her. Afterwards, she walks alone through the city and is stunned by the myriad ways in which life is different for her as an attractive white woman, though she notes that some misogyny transcends race. Her adventures are interrupted when she notices blood on her finger. She violently transforms back into her old self, leaving behind a trail of blood. Ruby escapes, limping into the street and hailing a taxi.

Three days later, Ruby returns to Caleb’s house because she is unable to shake the experience as Hillary from her mind. Caleb admits that they did not meet by coincidence and offers her a supply of the magic potion as part of a job offer. Ruby listens as Caleb explains the history of the Order and his father’s involvement, as well as the events of the previous summer. Caleb orchestrated the inheritance which paid for Letitia’s purchase of the Winthrop House, a plot to uncover the secrets hidden inside. He wants Ruby to ask Letitia about anything strange found in the house, while also attending gatherings of the Order to convince the various different lodges to join together under Caleb’s leadership. Ruby accepts.

Ruby attends a party at a country club as Hillary. The guests are from lodges around the country, and Ruby tells herself that she is playing a character. She mingles and listens to the dull conversations about magic. Occasionally, the white guests mention other races with disgust. Together with an elderly woman from New York, Ruby examines the book stolen by Caleb from Winthrop’s museum. Captain Lancaster stands by the book and makes sure no one is allowed to touch it. Lancaster explains to the guests how Caleb has convinced him to join their lodges together. He calls on the other guests to do the same. Caleb delivers a speech of his own, in which he admits to sabotaging his father’s ritual and killing the entire Ardham lodge. He claims that the Order is stuck in the past and he wants to modernize it by acting more like scientists and less like alchemists. To elect a leader for his new vision for the Order, he proposes a competition to find the best practitioner of magic. The guests reluctantly accept.

After the party, Ruby goes back to Caleb’s house. The potion begins to wear off while they have sex, and she scratches his skin with her bloody nails. The next morning, she sees the scratch marks on his body, as well as tattooed letters written in the language of Adam. Caleb explains that the words are his mark of Cain and they protect him. Ruby believes that Lancaster sees Caleb as a rival. She warns Caleb, but he seems unconcerned. He asks her to pretend to be a maid in his house to help divert Lancaster’s attention. In return, he offers her the deeds to the house and an unlimited supply of the potion.

Ruby spends time at the Winthrop House and Caleb’s townhouse. The house is watched by Lancaster’s men, so she allows them to see both herself and Hillary entering and exiting. In doing so, she allows Caleb to escape Lancaster’s attentions. One day, Caleb convinces her to plant a magical charm in Lancaster’s office. The stress of the job takes a toll on Ruby, but Caleb richly rewards her with money and access to the potion. One day, however, she ventures into the basement and discovers the source of the potion: a white woman with red hair is kept in a glass coffin, unconscious as her blood is drained. Caleb appears and explains that the potion is made from the woman’s blood. The woman in the coffin is Dell, still in a coma after being knocked unconscious by Atticus back in Ardham. Caleb tries to justify the arrangement, but Ruby is horrified. Caleb tells her to take some time to think about their deal.