Local author uses fiction to shine light on trauma

ASHEBORO — Jarod Cruthis has broken the mold of the traditional Southern male in his new novel, “The House of Salt and Ash.”

It’s the first book of the three-part North Pointe Series, described in the editor’s notes as “a haunting Southern Gothic family saga set along the salt marshes, old roads, and buried sins of Salter’s Cove, where bloodlines are never simple, inheritance comes with a cost, and the past does not stay dead simply because men have tried to bury it.”

Jonah Garrison is the central figure, returning to North Pointe, his childhood home town “along the salt marshes, old roads, and buried sins of Salter’s Cove,” his family’s ancestral home. He knows he has old matters to settle but only after unveiling family secrets.

One of those uncovered secrets is his half brother, Silas. They have to learn to support each other, which was not provided by their father.

Or, as the editor’s note says, “This is a series about brothers and blood. About men learning whether strength means silence or truth.”

Cruthis, who lives in Archdale, is a psychotherapist and minister, recently accepting the pastorate of Charlotte Methodist Church near Lake Lucas.

“I treat mental health and substance abuse but trauma is what I like to treat,” he said in an interview. “So many men don’t feel safe talking about their trauma. Nobody wants to talk about it. When you sit with people with trauma, it starts to affect you as well.”

Cruthis said he keeps a journal to put down his innermost thoughts dealing with his own trauma. His experience dealing with mental health issues was a catalyst in writing the North Pointe Series.

He talked to his wife Christy about the possibilities and they agreed, “Let’s just write about it and pull off the bandaids. I wrote things so raw it’s real. Why not write about it, putting it in fiction form and let people see there is healing after trauma.”

The setting for North Pointe is based on the Cruthises living for several years at Beaufort. His descriptions recreate the marsh, the water and the old house where Jonah grew up. Even the house is a character in the book.

“The house had to become a character because the main character had no other witnesses,” Cruthis said. The house was a witness to Jonah’s unloving upbringing, during which he felt trapped but nobody could see except the house. 

“It’s almost like the house turned its back as well,” said Cruthis, to Jonah’s loneliness. So when he returned after many years, he found that the “house never gave comfort.”

Then Silas enters the picture and Jonah has found documents showing that they share the same father, who “used his pastorate to hide his lustful ways.”

Jonah sees Silas’ insecurity and is “trying to be the opposite of what their father was, give Silas what he didn’t get and become the man he needed.”

Cruthis creates a brotherhood in the two that goes against the ways of society, brothers not afraid to embrace and show their love for each other despite their occasional arguments.

His dedication at the beginning of the book says it’s “For the boys who learned to be still, for the men who learned to hide, and for all who were taught silence when they needed the truth. And for the faithful dead, whose shadows still walk beside us, waiting for their stories to be told.”

But “The House of Salt and Ash” is much more than about two brothers who find each other. There are mysteries to solve, hidden dealings of their father to explore, and adversaries who just want them to be gone by any means.

Cruthis said the focus of Book 1 is water, cleansing and baptism. Book 2, which is in the planning stages, has a theme of light as the plantation home is rebuilt and relit. Book 3 will also have its own quality.

Cruthis’s bio says:

“A psychotherapist and minister, he has spent his life in rooms where pain speaks plainly — across from men and women wrestling addiction, trauma, grief, shame, and the long echo of rejection. That work has stripped him of easy answers. It has also sharpened his conviction that every human being bears an inviolable dignity no institution can grant and no institution has the right to deny. 

“He is a fierce advocate for social justice, equality, and the full humanity of those too often pushed to the margins — those the Church has misunderstood, ignored, or outright wounded. He believes doctrine without mercy becomes cruelty, and piety without courage becomes performance. 

“The House of Salt and Ash, the first novel in the Salter’s Cove series, emerges from his conviction that the land remembers, that houses keep records, and that what is buried in bloodlines will surface until someone has the courage to face it.”

The book is available at Walmart, Target, Barnes & Noble and Books A Million as well as online at Amazon.