Oreo Teeth reviewed Whistling Past the Graveyard by Susan Crandall
Review of 'Whistling Past the Graveyard' on 'Goodreads'
4 stars
I received an advance review copy of Susan Crandall's book Whistling Past the Graveyard from NetGalley and was very happy to review it. It's an excellent and thought-provoking read. The novel is set in the Civil Rights era, where our heroine Starla is a nine year old girl who is primarily being raised by her grandmother. After she confronts a bully and breaks his nose, she fears that her grandmother will send her off to reform school as his mother wants. So she runs away to join her mother who abandoned the family when Starla was three to try to become a star in Nashville. On the road, she is picked up by Eula, a black woman who has taken in an abandoned white baby.
Starla learns firsthand of the racism and cruelty of the era. Eula is trying her best to keep the children safe in a time and …
I received an advance review copy of Susan Crandall's book Whistling Past the Graveyard from NetGalley and was very happy to review it. It's an excellent and thought-provoking read. The novel is set in the Civil Rights era, where our heroine Starla is a nine year old girl who is primarily being raised by her grandmother. After she confronts a bully and breaks his nose, she fears that her grandmother will send her off to reform school as his mother wants. So she runs away to join her mother who abandoned the family when Starla was three to try to become a star in Nashville. On the road, she is picked up by Eula, a black woman who has taken in an abandoned white baby.
Starla learns firsthand of the racism and cruelty of the era. Eula is trying her best to keep the children safe in a time and place where just being with two white children brings its own danger. Her best is not always good enough, which makes for a heartbreaking read. Starla has an entertaining voice and her observations are worth hearing. At times the book goes a bit heavy-handed on white guilt but overall it treats the subject of the battle for equality with tenderness and a little bit of well-needed humor.
Whistling Past the Graveyard has a very good buddy story as its central relationship. The bond that develops between Starla and Eula happens gradually and realistically as they slowly make their way to Nashville together. I found myself pulling for these two even as I knew that their "quest" was a truly bad idea likely to end in Starla's disillusionment. I rate the book 4 stars out of five.