by Claude McKay edited by Jean-Christophe Cloutier & Brent Hayes Edwards ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 7, 2017
Full of now-arcane references to historical moments and political movements past but still engaging and well-paced.
Newly discovered novel by the great chronicler of the Harlem Renaissance, a sweeping satire of clashing ideologies and ambitions north of 110th Street.
“The time was ungodly tough for God’s swarthy step-children”: written in 1941, McKay’s novel describes a time a few years earlier, when Harlem was alive with talk of African-American civil rights as Franklin Roosevelt entered his third term as president. The proponents of “Aframerican”—McKay’s coinage—self-determination have a new cause in an Ethiopia beset by an invasion on the part of fascist Italy. As the novel opens, a certain Pablo Peixota, said to be Brazilian, is at the head of a boisterous crowd gathered to honor the arrival of an envoy from Haile Selassie’s besieged throne; “the Emperor of Ethiopia had condescended,” McKay writes, “to send a representative as a token of his goodwill and to give encouragement and inspiration to the efforts of the Aframericans.” Most effortful of all is a strange fellow named Professor Koazhy, who arrives “bedecked in a uniform so rare, so gorgeous, it made the people prance and shout for joy.” He aims, it seems, to outdo the emperor himself in splendor, but the good professor has other intentions. So, too, do the local Communists, who, seeing a political movement building, can’t help but want to co-opt it: “the Hands to Ethiopia was not interesting as one means of defending Ethiopia, but only as an organization that might be captured by the Marxists to help expand the gargantuanesque inflated maw of the Popular Front.” Against this backdrop of rising contention are a string of characters who, with aims ranging from the noble to the self-serving, drop in and out of the narrative. McKay writes with broad, pointed humor without resorting to lampooning, although the symbolism gets a little heavier handed as it arrives at an unexpectedly violent close.
Full of now-arcane references to historical moments and political movements past but still engaging and well-paced.Pub Date: Feb. 7, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-14-310731-6
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Penguin
Review Posted Online: Dec. 18, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2017
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by Susan Crandall ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 2, 2013
Young Starla is an endearing character whose spirited observations propel this nicely crafted story.
Crandall (Sleep No More, 2010, etc.) delivers big with a coming-of-age story set in Mississippi in 1963 and narrated by a precocious 9-year-old.
Due in part to tradition, intimidation and Jim Crow laws, segregation is very much ingrained into the Southern lifestyle in 1963. Few white children question these rules, least of all Starla Caudelle, a spunky young girl who lives with her stern, unbending grandmother in Cayuga Springs, Miss., and spends an inordinate amount of time on restriction for her impulsive actions and sassy mouth. Starla’s dad works on an oil rig in the Gulf; her mother abandoned the family to seek fame and fortune in Nashville when Starla was 3. In her youthful innocence, Starla’s convinced that her mother’s now a big singing star, and she dreams of living with her again one day, a day that seems to be coming more quickly than Starla’s anticipated. Convinced that her latest infraction is about to land her in reform school, Starla decides she has no recourse but to run away from home and head to Nashville to find her mom. Ill prepared for the long, hot walk and with little concept of time and distance, Starla becomes weak and dehydrated as she trudges along the hot, dusty road. She gladly accepts water and a ride from Eula, a black woman driving an old truck, and finds, to her surprise, that she’s not Eula’s only passenger. Inside a basket is a young white baby, an infant supposedly abandoned outside a church, whom Eula calls James. Although Eula doesn’t intend to drive all the way to Nashville, when she shows up at her home with the two white children, a confrontation with her husband forces her into becoming a part of Starla’s journey, and it’s this journey that creates strong bonds between the two: They help each other face fears as they each become stronger individuals. Starla learns firsthand about the abuse and scare tactics used to intimidate blacks and the skewed assumption of many whites that blacks are inferior beings. Assisted by a black schoolteacher who shows Eula and Starla unconditional acceptance and kindness, both ultimately learn that love and kinship transcend blood ties and skin color.
Young Starla is an endearing character whose spirited observations propel this nicely crafted story.Pub Date: July 2, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-4767-0772-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2013
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by Lisa Wingate ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 6, 2017
Wingate sheds light on a shameful true story of child exploitation but is less successful in engaging readers in her...
Avery Stafford, a lawyer, descendant of two prominent Southern families and daughter of a distinguished senator, discovers a family secret that alters her perspective on heritage.
Wingate (Sisters, 2016, etc.) shifts the story in her latest novel between present and past as Avery uncovers evidence that her Grandma Judy was a victim of the Tennessee Children’s Home Society and is related to a woman Avery and her father meet when he visits a nursing home. Although Avery is living at home to help her parents through her father’s cancer treatment, she is also being groomed for her own political career. Readers learn that investigating her family’s past is not part of Avery's scripted existence, but Wingate's attempts to make her seem torn about this are never fully developed, and descriptions of her chemistry with a man she meets as she's searching are also unconvincing. Sections describing the real-life orphanage director Georgia Tann, who stole poor children, mistreated them, and placed them for adoption with wealthy clients—including Joan Crawford and June Allyson—are more vivid, as are passages about Grandma Judy and her siblings. Wingate’s fans and readers who enjoy family dramas will find enough to entertain them, and book clubs may enjoy dissecting the relationship and historical issues in the book.
Wingate sheds light on a shameful true story of child exploitation but is less successful in engaging readers in her fictional characters' lives.Pub Date: June 6, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-425-28468-1
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: March 20, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2017
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by Lisa Wingate
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