In Johnson’s novel, faith and mysticism bring two people on uncertain paths together in the mountains of Appalachia.
On the surface, Amanda Abernathy and Cody Stone have little in common, save their mental infirmities. Amanda is a 17-year-old who, after a serious head injury, now lives with vivid, waking nightmares. Cody, meanwhile, is just another young veteran returned home from Vietnam with debilitating shellshock, his mind ever calling him back to the horrors he witnessed in the jungle. But in their shared “spells” an inexplicable bond emerges, a mystical connection between two people who have never met and don’t even know each other’s names. Their paths will eventually cross on South Mountain at Yellow Bird—the dilapidated bookstore that Amanda inherited from her grandmother—but not before weathering small-town scandals, skirmishes with the local coal company and a disaster of almost biblical proportions. Johnson’s debut is, at its core, a pastoral tale, a celebration of the rustic music and rich traditions of the hills and hollows of Virginia and West Virginia and their ability to offer relief and purpose in a harsh, lonesome world. The narrative employs a unique dual tone, portraying its everyday events and folksy setting with blunt, obtuse language while contrasting that with lyrical, dreamlike prose for Amanda and Cody’s trances. Occasionally the latter is overly vague, but much of the novel’s appeal is in its coyness with details, and since the characters are so willing to accept the strange or the spiritual, the wealth of unanswered questions isn’t as distressing as one might expect. Though the novel is not devoid of action, it’s at its best in the small moments, when characters are talking, sharing stories or enjoying meals. Quaintness is what the novel honors, and in its depiction of this quaintness, the book excels.
Old-fashioned but never stodgy; a charming story about a bygone time where even magic seems possible.Pub Date: June 24, 2010
ISBN: 978-0578069739
Page Count: 151
Publisher: Garden Gate Farm
Review Posted Online: Aug. 1, 2011
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Categories: GENERAL FICTION
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BOOK REVIEW
A middle-aged woman returns to her childhood home to care for her ailing father, confronting many painful secrets from her past.
When Mallory Aldiss gets a call from a long-ago boyfriend telling her that her elderly father has been gallivanting around town with a gun in his hand, Mallory decides it’s time to return to the small Rhode Island town that she’s been avoiding for more than a decade. Mallory’s precocious 13-year-old daughter, Joy, is thrilled that she'll get to meet her grandfather at long last, and an aunt, too, and she'll finally see the place where her mother grew up. When they arrive in Bay Bluff, it’s barely a few hours before Mallory bumps into her old flame, Jack, the only man she’s ever really loved. Gone is the rebellious young person she remembers, and in his place stands a compassionate, accomplished adult. As they try to reconnect, Mallory realizes that the same obstacle that pushed them apart decades earlier is still standing in their way: Jack blames Mallory’s father for his mother’s death. No one knows exactly how Jack’s mother died, but Jack thinks a love affair between her and Mallory’s father had something to do with it. As Jack and Mallory chase down answers, Mallory also tries to repair her rocky relationships with her two sisters and determine why her father has always been so hard on her. Told entirely from Mallory’s perspective, the novel has a haunting, nostalgic quality. Despite the complex and overlapping layers to the history of Bay Bluff and its inhabitants, the book at times trudges too slowly through Mallory’s meanderings down Memory Lane. Even so, Delinsky sometimes manages to pick up the pace, and in those moments the beauty and nuance of this complicated family tale shine through. Readers who don’t mind skimming past details that do little to advance the plot may find that the juicier nuggets and realistically rendered human connections are worth the effort.
A touching family drama that effectively explores the negative impact of stress on fragile relationships.Pub Date: May 19, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-11951-3
Page Count: 416
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: March 2, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2020
Categories: FAMILY LIFE & FRIENDSHIP | GENERAL FICTION
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A love letter to the power of books and friendship.
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Women become horseback librarians in 1930s Kentucky and face challenges from the landscape, the weather, and the men around them.
Alice thought marrying attractive American Bennett Van Cleve would be her ticket out of her stifling life in England. But when she and Bennett settle in Baileyville, Kentucky, she realizes that her life consists of nothing more than staying in their giant house all day and getting yelled at by his unpleasant father, who owns a coal mine. She’s just about to resign herself to a life of boredom when an opportunity presents itself in the form of a traveling horseback library—an initiative from Eleanor Roosevelt meant to counteract the devastating effects of the Depression by focusing on literacy and learning. Much to the dismay of her husband and father-in-law, Alice signs up and soon learns the ropes from the library’s leader, Margery. Margery doesn’t care what anyone thinks of her, rejects marriage, and would rather be on horseback than in a kitchen. And even though all this makes Margery a town pariah, Alice quickly grows to like her. Along with several other women (including one black woman, Sophia, whose employment causes controversy in a town that doesn’t believe black and white people should be allowed to use the same library), Margery and Alice supply magazines, Bible stories, and copies of books like Little Women to the largely poor residents who live in remote areas. Alice spends long days in terrible weather on horseback, but she finally feels happy in her new life in Kentucky, even as her marriage to Bennett is failing. But her powerful father-in-law doesn’t care for Alice’s job or Margery’s lifestyle, and he’ll stop at nothing to shut their library down. Basing her novel on the true story of the Pack Horse Library Project established by the Works Progress Administration in the 1930s, Moyes (Still Me, 2018, etc.) brings an often forgotten slice of history to life. She writes about Kentucky with lush descriptions of the landscape and tender respect for the townspeople, most of whom are poor, uneducated, and grateful for the chance to learn. Although Alice and Margery both have their own romances, the true power of the story is in the bonds between the women of the library. They may have different backgrounds, but their commitment to helping the people of Baileyville brings them together.
A love letter to the power of books and friendship.Pub Date: Oct. 8, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-399-56248-8
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Pamela Dorman/Viking
Review Posted Online: July 1, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2019
Categories: GENERAL FICTION | HISTORICAL FICTION | FAMILY LIFE & FRIENDSHIP
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