Child of the South [Mass Market Paperback]

Joanna Catherine Scott (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 7, 2009

From the award-winning author of The Road from Chapel Hill, a story of loyalty, duty, and love in the days following the Civil War.

Returning to characters introduced in her previous novel, acclaimed author Joanna Catherine Scott explores the terrain of a devastated South, where the war is over-but conflict lives on. Having endured years of hardship, Eugenia Mae Spotswood returns to Wilmington to find out who her mother is, only to be faced with racism and hatred...until she is befriended by the most powerful Negro leader in the state Senate.

Also driven forward are the strong-minded ex-slave Tom and his crippled former enemy Clyde Bricket. Tom spent the last years of the war working for the Union as a spy. Now, Clyde watches as his family farm slowly dies. Only if they work together can they survive...

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Joanna Catherine Scott was born in England, raised in Australia, and took her graduate degree in Philosophy at Duke University. She is the author of four previous novels as well as works of nonfiction and poetry. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 18 and up
  
• Mass Market Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: Berkley Trade; 1 edition (April 7, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0425226026
• ISBN-13: 978-0425226025
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,548,157 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Joanna Catherine Scott (1943--) was born in England during an air raid over London, raised in Australia by a rabidly religious mother and a phlegmatic engineer father, married way too young, divorced, fell in love again and came with her American husband to live in the US where, aside from a couple of years in the Philippines, she has lived below the Mason Dixon line ever since. Her five novels and oral history collection have all been based on true life stories, giving voice to the voiceless. Her poetry tells stories too. She has six children, three Australian and three adopted Korean, as well as a young man whom she met while he was on death row whom she regards as her seventh child. A Woodrow Wilson Visiting Fellow, she is a graduate of Adelaide and Duke Universities and lives in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. Her website is www.joannacatherinescott.com.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars deep look at the aftermath of the Civil War, May 9, 2009

By 

Harriet Klausner - See all my reviews
(#1 Hall OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Child of the South (Mass Market Paperback)

With the Civil War over, half-breed Eugenia May Spotswood returns home searching for family especially the one her mother to belong to, but mostly finding hate between her two worlds of black and white. One noted exception is a black North Carolina senator who befriends Eugenia May giving her powerful backing.

A former slave Tom served as a spy for the Union while Clyde Bricket fought for the Confederacy. They come home to North Carolina where they meet in poverty as neither has much of anything except Tom is free and Clyde is crippled. If they can get past their prejudice and forge a team, they can rebuild their homes; separately neither can stand up to those who want the new South to remain devastated.

The sequel to THE ROAD FROM CHAPEL HILL (not read by me) is a profound look at the South struggling to recover from the ravages of the Civil War, mostly fought below the Mason-Dixon Line. The characters are fully developed so that the good, the bad, and the ugly compete for how the New South will be shaped. With more subplots than above that merge into a deep look at the aftermath of the Civil War, Joanna Catherine Scott provides a powerful historical.

Harriet Klausner

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A book for our times, April 24, 2009

By 

nkc "nkc" (NC) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Child of the South (Mass Market Paperback)

Although it stands on its own, Child of the South is a sequel to Scott's acclaimed The Road to Chapel Hill. It does not disappoint. Suspense and romance play out on the stage of post-Civil War North Carolina, hopes raised only to be dashed and raised again. There is much engrossing history here, seen through the eyes of two compelling characters: Tom (in third person) and Eugenia Mae(in first person), but never losing the luminous poetic quality for which Scott's prose is known.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars History retrieved., January 15, 2011

By 

Martina Vanderley "Martina Vanderley, author ... (Raleigh, N.C.) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Child of the South (Mass Market Paperback)

"Child of the South" is a story about the aftermath of the War between the North and the South. "The Civil War" can hardly be called "civil" (as I see it) because of its loss of lives on both sides of the conflict. The author descibed the aftermath in great detail: the hostility, racial tension and hatred, the rebuilding of the south and the political unrest and differences. Then she has it intertwined with family relationships, and a love story, which is spellbinding. The characters of the ex-slave Tom; Eugenia Mae, the Mulatto girl; and Clyde Bricket, a Southern boy crippled during the war; are so lifelike, the reader feels their anguish, their fear and hope. The story partly written in the first and third person gives the novel a realistic view. I loved it from beginning till end. Great reading!