Customer Reviews

Getting Mother's Body: A Novel

5 star:		(18)
4 star:		(15)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Playwright Suzan-Lori Parkss debut novel, Getting Mothers Body, has an affinity to William Faulkners classic, As I Lay Dying, only this time, Parks has flipped the script in a couple of areas. First, instead of taking a body home to be buried, the characters are planning to exhume the remains of one high-strung, party girl/singer, Willa Mae Beede; and secondly, the characters are African American, the setting is 1963 rural Texas, and the lead character is Billy Beede, a poor pregnant, unwed, high school dropout.

After her mothers (Willa Mae) untimely demise, Billy returns to Lincoln by her mothers lesbian lover, Dill Smiles, to live with her maternal uncle, Roosevelt, and his wife, June, in their trailer behind a gas station. Billy becomes pregnant by a married man and believes an abortion will solve all of her problems. To get the money for the procedure, she plans a journey back to Arizona to recover the small fortune (a pearl necklace and diamond ring) which according to Dill adorns Willa Maes corpse. Billy is accompanied by an eccentric cast of characters, each with selfish desires for the treasure, each hoping it will fill a hole. These holes run deep ranging from pride, envy, debt to lust, unrequited love, childlessness, and spiritual loss. Billy becomes an expert in recognizing holes, i.e. finding ones weaknesses, and uses her gift to manipulate her family and strangers to get what she wantsunknowingly becoming more like the con artist mother that she despises.

This novel, told in first person by each lead character, causes the reader to experience the journey from differing viewpoints. Often times, the chapters represent character perspectives of the same event granting the reader the opportunity to hear multiple sides of the story. The author even interjects observations, blues songs, and ominous passages by the deceased Willa Mae. The use of monologues allows the reader to learn firsthand each characters motivation, vulnerabilities, and haunted pasts; these elements contributed to the novels well developed characters. This reviewer also enjoyed the writing style and the extensive use of regional dialect to add realism to the dialogue.

Without a clue on how this story was going to end until the end, I was happy that the journey ultimately brought about some semblance of absolution and redemption for the motley crew, which was a welcomed relief for an otherwise dismal tale. There is a lot more to this story than this review covers; one has to read to appreciate all the author has to offer. Ms. Parks shows great promise and if you enjoy deviating from the relationship drama of modern contemporary fiction, you may enjoy this book. I think readers who enjoyed eclectic works like Lolita Filess Child of God and Olympia Vernons Eden might appreciate this novel.

Phyllis
APOOO BookClub, The Nubian Circle Book Club

Susan-Lori Parks' Getting Mother's Body is an entertaining story of Billy Beede, a pregnant sixteen year old who is convinced that she must travel from Texas to Arizona and dig up her mother's grave to claim the jewels she is buried with. The only problem is, she has no money and no way of getting there. How she gets there, and the people she lies to, cheats on, and cons make up this uproarious read. Parks' novel is narrated by a number of characters, some central, some not and its just a fun, funny read. Parks is certainly creative and a skilled writer. Have fun with this one.

Full of gossip and adventure, Getting Mother's Body is the story of a few small-town folks with big dreams. Billy Beede, the daughter of six-years dead Willa Mae Beede finds herself in this novel. Pregnant and given a deadline of one week, Billy needs abortion money fast. Uncle and aunt in tow, they set off on a mission that leads from Texas to Arizona to dig up Willa Mae's body and the rumored treasure that was buried with her. Along the way this sad group of Beedes reminise over the life and tragic death of Willa Mae and how their own lifes have changed over the years. Dill Smiles, Willa Mae's lover, has a secret of her own though, and with murder on her mind sets off hot on Billy's trail.

This book was a really fun read. I enjoyed each and every page. Good authors make their characters real and Parks does this grandly, I could even feel the Arizona heat and Texas dust. Don't browse over this novel. Superb!

"Where my panties at?" are the great opening lines of this wondrous comic novel; but you "aint seen nothing" yet. The critics insist on saying Ms. Parks is influenced here by William Faulkner's AS I LAY DYING, something I don't see much of although I did hear her in an interview recently say nice things about Faulkner. Ms. Parks is certainly a classy lady.

And she has written a classy novel. Billy Beede, named after Billie Holiday in spite of the spelling of her first name, is sixteen, unmarried and pregnant. She is joined by a host of other motley characters: Dill Smiles. . . "the most honest person I know, even if she ain't nothing but a bulldagger." Then there's Roosevelt Beede, a minister who no longer preaches; his wife June Flowers Beede, who only has one leg; Laz Jackson, named for Lazarus in the New Testament because he was born not breathing, who wants to marry Billy even though he is not the father of her unborn child--actually he's still a virgin when the novel begins--and of course Willa Mae Beede, Billy's mother and Dill's former lover, who is now in her grave and may have been buried with previous gems. There are several other minor characters, just as interesting, not the least of which is Homer Beede Rochfoucault, the son of a Morehouse man and a Spelman graduate. There's also a sympathetic white deputy sheriff, someone we might not expect to find in 1963, the year this novel takes place.

Told from several points of view-- perhaps the writer is influenced by Faulkner after all-- the novel ultimately is about the importance of family. These characters-- most of them either dirt poor or, in the case of Homer and his mother, people who have suffered a reversal of fortune-- are as strong as the state of Texas. Like Faulkner's Dilsey in THE SOUND AND THE FURY, they endure.

That Ms. Parks first made her mark as a dramatist-- she won the Pulitzer for her play TOPDOG/UNDERDOG-- is obvious from the language here as one dialogue builds on another.

For all these characters' misfortunes-- and they suffer many-- you will feel good about the ending of this story. Billy says: "Going back home we made good time. I think we did all right." Ms. Parks does much better than "all right" in this poignant, bittersweet novel.

Getting Mother's Body tells the story of Billy Beade and her family and friends on a road trip to dig up the treasure buried with Billy's mother Willa Mae. Each is equally desperate for the money from the treasure, but all for different reasons. The story was exciting, hardly ever predictable, and intelligent.

Lately, I've been tired of picking up novels that seemed interesting, only to find wooden characters, well-worn plot devices, and cliched dialogue. Not here. Ms. Parks has created a stunning cast of characters, each beautifully developed to the perfect degree to fit the plot, no more, no less. The story is written from Mulitple view points, each providing a small glimpse at the larger picture of the story. For this novel, however, the whole is greater than the some of it's parts - each point of view provides enough of the plot that the reader can synthesize them into a whole. This is a novel for a reader who doesn't want everything handed to them on the page, who enjoys synthesizing information to come to thier own conclusions. I have recommended this novel to many friends and family with much success. highly recommended.

Parks's novel has been compared to Faulker's "As I Lay Dying", presumably because each chapter is told from the perspective of a different person. The story line is clear enough, young un-married Billy Beede finds herself jilted after buying a beautiful wedding dress that costs too much, traveling a long distance by bus with the rest of her money to meet her fiance on the day before their planned wedding. When she arrives, not only does she discover he is not at home but that he has a wife and gaggle of children. She decides she needs to abort her pregnancy, but does not have the money to do so. She decides that she is going to unearth her buried mother's remains, and lay claim to the riches her mother insisted on being buried with. The only problem is that her mother is buried in Arizona and Billy does not have the money or the transportation to get there. She decides to con her mother's ex-lover, who claims to have carried out the dying wishes of Billy's mother and buried the pearl necklace and diamond ring with her. But did she? After all, she has the expense of a hog farm to keep up, and that shiny new truck... Billy steals the keys to Dill's new truck to make the trek to Arizona with various family members towing along hoping for a fair share of the riches. Dill, of course, races to get there first to prevent the truth from coming out, that no jewels were in fact buried with Billy's mother.

Since each chapter is told from a differing perspective, we gain insight into each characters motivations, thoughts, and of course, their lack of insight as well. The shifting perspective is a refreshing way to tell a story, if not entirely original. The characters keep you interested and the story unfolds without much effort to concentrate. I enjoyed this book and will read this author again.

I just discovered your website, or I would have written a year ago, when I read the book. I read an excerpt of it in Essence magazine while on a cruise in May 2003 and I bought the hard cover as soon as I got home. I give it 5 stars only because I can't give 6! I thoroughly enjoyed this novel and just recently mailed it to my friend in Florida. I told her not to judge the characters-just enjoy them! Many people in the book are "mojo"-meaning 'slow' and/or ignorant but I got a kick out of each and every one of them. What a refreshing book! I'll be looking out for more novels by Ms Parks.

I agree with the reader from Mobile, AL. Getting Mother's Body along with ZZ Packer's Drinking Coffee Elsewhere are two of the freshest, most exciting works of African American fiction that I have come across in years. They're also two of the best books I've bought this year. Both books (Packer's is a collection of short stories) eschews the common girlfriends/black-men-are-no-good themes of most comtemporary black writers like McMillan and shy away from more cerebral themes like Morrison or Walker. Instead this is fiction, straight forward fiction meant to entertian, that just so happens to have black main characters.

Getting Mother's Body, like McMillan's Day Late and a Dollar Short, is told from the POV of several characters with the purposeful use of bad grammar. Although some grammatical purists may find it difficult to get into the novel for that reason, I felt it lent an honest and real voice to the characters. Not everyone says "are not" instead of "ain't" or "going to" instead of "gonna". Personally, I found the purposeful use of bad grammar more difficlut to follow in McMillan's Day Late... than Getting Mother's Body.

I won't go into the particulars of the novel as so many others have. What I will say is that this is a breezy, fast and fun read. Parks is a vivid storyteller and her images scroll across your mind like a well paced movie. Pick this up and see for yourself. Pure, unadulterated fun.

One of the most innovative and cool aspects of Suzan-Lori Park's Getting Mother's Body is that she recorded a companion CD that has the songs that are written in the book. They're blues fun and Parks has good voice. They add a lot of depth and creativity to the novel and it's disappointing that they don't come with the book. If you want to hear them you have to buy them separately from CD Baby. Or, if you purchase the audiobook the songs are also on there.

It's very much like William Faulkner's As I Lay Dying with multiple POVs as a family go on a journey together, all having their own motivations. There are so many themes. Gender. Homosexuality. Race. Spirituality. Morality. Adultery. Class differences. Capitalism. Teen pregnancy. Betrayal. Infertility. Patriarchy. Identity. Self-worth. And others. This, as one can imagine, spreads each subject a little thin.

Overall, the writing isn't fantastic. The plot is fairly predictable and there are some noticeable holes. The ending seems very false.

Bravo and Kudo's to Ms.Parks! This story will have all your emotions working, you'll laugh,cry and get mad at some of the character's! Most of all you'll get sucked into this wonderful story. This is one of those reads where you won't stop reading until you reach the end. I reccomend this great read to all!