Book excerpt: Savage Holiday, first published in 1954 by noted American author Richard Wright, is a tense, well-written psychological thriller about Erskine Fowler, an insurance executive forced into early retirement, who, over the course of a bizarre weekend, is responsible for the accidental death of his neighbor’s young son. Tragic consequences follow as Fowler attempts to redeem himself and is forced to question his own life, as events spiral out-of-control to their inevitable conclusion.