Henry Townsend is a former slave. His old owner took a liking to Henry and so has helped him out in his shoe-making business. Henry eventually makes enough money to build his own small plantation house and to start buying his own slaves. The book begins with Henry’s death and skips around in time to […]
Zora Neale Hurston grew up in Eatonville, FL, “the first incorporated all-black township in the United States.” In this fictional account of an incident in her childhood, Eatonville at first seems to be idyllic. Sure, the residents aren’t very well off, but they’re safe and free to be whoever they’d like. After a headless corpse […]
Alice has always been the odd one in her small Appalachian community. She loves water, her hair grows incredibly fast, her feet are slightly webbed, and somehow her personality has just never “fit in.” She’s done her best all her life to blend into the background, but she gets quite a bit of publicity when […]
Abby Sinclair is the neglected daughter of a plantation owner. Three years after the end of the Civil War, she is still mourning the loss of her uncle and her family is still adjusting to the loss of their slaves. When her father decides to move the whole family out to the Outer Banks of […]
I would say that Bound South is a group of connected short stories. There’s not really one plot that connects the chapters. Instead, I would say that the author uses these stories, told from the points of view of three different Southern ladies, to explore issues they each face and how hard it can be […]
Lily Davis was only 17 when she married a boy she had known for a short time. He was shipping out to WWII soon as a supply man for Coca-Cola and it seemed like the thing to do before he went away. Three years later, her hometown of Toccoa, Georgia has scheduled a big homecoming […]
Hart Bonner is the son of a formerly prosperous plantation owner. Jennie Grant is his cousin’s biracial cook. In South Carolina in the early 1900s, she is considered a “Negro” and it is a felony for a white man to have “relations” with her. She and Hart carry on a secret affair for years though. […]
I decided to read this because Thomas Wolfe was from my area and I only had to read one short story of his for an English class. I wanted to see what he was all about. This is basically the slightly fictionalized story of his childhood and young adult years growing up in the mountains […]
In Depression-era North Carolina, a timber baron marries Serena and brings her to the lumber camps to live. Her ambition outmatches his and she drives him to succeed, prosper, and expand at any cost. Wow. What a character Ron Rash has created in Serena. I detested her, but she is going to stick with me […]
3.5 Stars. I really liked the whole story, I just felt that I wanted a little more meat to it. That’s really my only criticism. I liked the way that Emily learned the value of family. Julia learns that for most people, home will always be home, no matter how hard you try to leave it behind. I loved the way that the Coffeys […]
In Jackson, Mississippi during the Civil Rights era, a white woman stumbles on the idea of writing a book about the black maids of the area and the white families they work for. There have been so many great reviews written for this book, that I don’t know if I have a whole lot more […]