Mother of Pearl (Oprah's Book Club) [Paperback]

Melinda Haynes (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 1, 2000

Capturing all the rueful irony and racial ambivalence of small-town Mississippi in the late 1950s, Melinda Haynes' celebrated novel is a wholly unforgettable exploration of family, identity, and redemption. Mother of Pearl revolves around twenty-eight-year-old Even Grade, a black man who grew up an orphan, and Valuable Korner, the fifteen-year-old white daughter of the town whore and an unknown father. Both are passionately determined to discover the precious things neither experienced as children: human connection, enduring commitment, and, above all, unconditional love. A startlingly accomplished mixture of beauty, mystery, and tragedy, Mother of Pearl marks the debut of an extraordinary literary talent.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Oprah Book Club® Selection, June 1999: Twenty-eight-year-old Even Grade is a black man who was orphaned as a child; 15-year-old Valuable Korner is a white girl who might as well have been. Petal, Mississippi, circa 1956, seems an unlikely spot for these two to connect, but it soon becomes apparent in Mother of Pearl that a friendship across race lines is just one of many miracles waiting to happen in this small Southern town. Melinda Haynes's remarkable debut novel begins in a hot August, when young Val's lifelong friendship with Jackson McClain is starting to change into something more profound, and Even is falling crazy in love with Joody Two Sun, a mixed-race woman with amazing powers.

Woven in and around these two central love stories are myriad other characters, other tales. There is 16-year-old Joleb Green, for example, whose mother was incapacitated by a stroke when he was born, and who was raised by the black housekeeper, Grace. There is Even's friend Canaan, an older black man who spends his time reading Greek tragedy and writing his work "The Reality of the Negro"; Valuable's mother, Enid, the town whore; and Neva and Bea, a lesbian couple who have helped to raise the girl. Until this year, blacks and whites have occupied separate universes, for the most part; then Joleb Green suffers a terrible accident, and it is Joody Two Sun who saves his life and Grace who restores his soul. At the same time, a pregnant Val arrives on Joody and Even's doorstep, hungry for the understanding and acceptance she cannot find at home. Though at first Even is resistant, Val's humanity soon transcends her color in his mind:

Even chuckled and shook his head, happy for a reason he couldn't distinguish other than at that moment of Canaan's near-perfect cast, all seemed right with the world, as right as a thing can be what with a white girl camped out in the middle of the Quarter with no plans of leaving.

Gradually, without really intending it, Joleb, Val, Even, Joody, Grace, and Canaan form something that looks suspiciously like a family--a relationship that will soon be tested to the limit when Val's baby is born.

Melinda Haynes has taken on a Herculean task, crafting a multicharacter story that reaches across racial barriers to encompass an entire community. She doesn't shy away from the ugliness in life--bigotry of every stripe, mean-spiritedness, betrayal, thoughtless cruelty, and death--but what interests her is the potential of the human heart to find space within itself for the most unexpected people. With its strong, lyrical language and fully realized characters, Mother of Pearl is a fine novel and a terrific introduction to a new literary voice. --Alix Wilber --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

Chicago Tribune Remarkable.

The Plain Dealer (Cleveland) Haynes is the real thing, a true artist, a genuine writer, and, in this book at least, a genius....Her characters live (do they ever) and Mother of Pearl transports us to the wilds of a different world.

Booklist (starred review) Both richly humorous and deeply tragic, this story leaves one wiser and makes one understand something meaningful and important about life and human nature. Haynes speaks the truth in a story that is astonishingly powerful.

Chicago Tribune Memorable....Less a portrait of the South in the 1950's and more a tale about how neccessity forces people to create bonds outside their own blood....Haynes works boldly with this large and eccentric cast....her prose has a rugged, muscular quality that is highly expressive and constantly surprising.

San Francisco Chronicle Book Review Like William Faulkner and Flannery O'Connor before her, Melinda Haynes recognizes that Southern culture has a lush affinity with the elements of classical tragedy...A pleasure to witness.

Pat Conroy author of Beach Music Haynes' sentences have the beauty of coined silver forks resting on linen. Her dialogue shimmers.

The New York Times Book Review Welcome to Petal, Mississippi, a real place on the map, but in Melinda Haynes' first novel, a fictional one as entangling as kudzu. In language as profuse and vigorous as that Southern vine, Haynes tells the story of Valuable Korner, a fatherless girl nomed after a real estate sign....A heart-thumper.

Publishers Weekly (starred review) In prose both rugged and beautiful, Haynes plumbs the secrets of the South in her stunning debut novel....She is fearless in portraying her characters' flaws, their pettiness and racism, their erring thoughts, but she's also merciful, letting them grow and change during the course of the narrative....This wise, luminous novel demonstrates her great gifts -- for language, courageous storytelling, and compassion.

Shelby Hearon author of Owning Jolene Mother of Pearl is a monumental novel set in the noble-speaking backcountry of Faulkner's Mississippi. In a luminous voice, original and true, Melinda Haynes tells the story, straight as a tree and deep as a pond, of the savage miseries and saving graces of the past and present in the Deep South. This is an unforgettable, heart-bending book.

Booklist (starred review) Phenomenal and completely captivating.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 496 pages
• Publisher: Washington Square Press (June 1, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0671774670
• ISBN-13: 978-0671774677
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.3 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (258 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #309,792 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

29 of 33 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Challenging, December 24, 1999

By 

Kathleen D. Coleman (Aloha, OR USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Mother of Pearl (Hardcover)

This book was a challenge to read. Haynes distinctive way of developing her characters and her long and expressive prose made me want to stop reading and move on to something that was more leisure in style. But I kept on reading. I found the book complex and thought provoking. Not only did I care about the characters but I wanted to know them and understand them in depth - to examine how many of their sides were firing (feelings, sensing, knowing, seeing, hearing and smelling - six sided women). I kept thinking of the dream of the pig and how it revealed itself to Canaan. Ripped down the middle with no insides - like Canaan racially split, a product of the time, and operating at a head level (one sideded). Most of his sides frozen and it was only when he met Grace did he begin to integrate - to make the longest trip in the world - the 18" from his head to his heart.

I finally understood as I kept reading and rereading trying desperately to follow the story and clearly understand each page that the real message for me was not to figure out what Haynes was trying to convey but to understand what the personal message was for me. Reading fiction should be a personal experience - my personal experience. There is not just one message here. Just as in my own personal life so many people, events, and things don't make sense. I often struggle to analyze and reanzlye . I become frustrated, angry and end up giving away my finite life energy to something outside of myself - something that I have no control over. There is a line from the Desiderta which says "no matter whether or not it is clear to you the Universe is unfolding as it should." So in conclusion the book's message to me was: *detach, step back and allow the flow to happen; *observe; *identify which sides are firing or misfiring as the case may be; *identify when I have been in a similar situation (s),how do I misfire? * how do I want to do it differently? * Learn, grown and move on.

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Book Club averaged 8++, February 23, 2000

By 

Nina (Minneapolis, MN) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Mother of Pearl (Hardcover)

Views were polarized between members. We had 2 members who rated it at less or equal to 2, and 5 members who rated it at 9+. Concensus of those who rated it 9+ was that there was definite connection to the characters; it was hard to believe that this was Haynes' first book. Her ability to write so that the reader could visualize was excellent; in most cases during most passages, readers all felt as though they were right there, experiencing events along with the characters. Haynes offered universal truths through Canaan, Joody, Even and Valuable and the book was absolutely "rich". My own experience with this book gives it a 9.5; I was taken with many of the characters. I was saddened by Luvenia's father - he had what seemed to be a God-believing spirit and yet to have been a murdering member of the KKK; and Joody's insight into what made up a "six-sided woman", her relationship with Even Grade, and my wondering as to whether or not I was or am a six-sided woman myself, along with her insight into Luvenia and her lack of understanding of the "fluids". Joody had intuitive insight into the importance of fluids (e.g., Valuable's birth and her "marking" the quilt - so insightful). I was taken with the stupidity, ignorance and prejudice of Beryn; the beauty of Beryn's sister Louise, her manner and her eventual relationship with the mortician; with the wonder of Joleb - who he was (so overcome with feeling the responsibility of the deaths of those he loved) and who he became through his relationship with Valuable and with Russ; the relationship between Valuable and Jackson and the beauty it held - their child relationship and it's evolution into a love relationship (and the repercussions of who they were to each other); the ties between Grace, Valuable, and Joleb - Totally unexpected.

THIS IS A GREAT BOOK!

Although this book is difficult to get into and to settle into it's cadence, it is well worth the challenge. There is "stretch" in reading this book, and Haynes pulls it together beautifully and with such visualization that i hated to have it end.

This is probably one of the best books (in my own estimation) that our book club has read. I would encourage you to read it, enjoy it, and to fall in love with all of the characters.

(One question that the club had was left unanswered. Therefore, if anyone has any insight into the pigs and their significance, please let us and everyone else know . . . these visions were one of the few confusing elements.)

Beautifully written in my estimation and emotionally draining for me. I hated for it to end. Excellent read!

14 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful, January 20, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Mother of Pearl (Hardcover)

I too am a voracious reader. I very, very, seldom read a book a second time (too many books, too little time). I will however, make an exception for this book.

Read it twice...the first time for the story; the second time for the language. I notice that none of the previous reviewers are from the south...maybe it helps to be southern to read, enjoy, and perhaps to understand this book. I loved it.