The Slow Way Back : A Novel by Judy Goldman  (15)
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Digging to America: A Novel by Anne Tyler  (18)
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Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
A mother goes to great lengths to defend her son in this slow-going, sentimental domestic tale with a racial spin. On the same night white student Early Smallwood delivers his high school’s commencement address, he shoots and kills a young black man in Charlotte, N.C., in 1987. His mother, first-person narrator Kathryne Smallwood, a movie critic for a local magazine and wife to a successful lawyer, Peter, proceeds to recount in exhaustive detail Early’s development from adored, overindulged only child and model pupil to accomplice to his delinquent childhood friend, Chip. Despite Kathryne’s anguished self-searching, however, there’s no convincing explanation for the valedictorian’s transformation into a murderer save that Early was in the wrong place in bad company. Poet and novelist Goldman (The Slow Way Back) strives to engage with complex racial questions, but her protagonist’s moral struggles are one-dimensional and dated as she struggles to reconcile her liberal self-image with her son’s act. At novel’s end, the Smallwoods remain bewildered by the changes around them, with Kathryne still wondering how she ended up "on the wrong side of a race issue." All too convincing as a study in self-delusion, this is too deliberate and uninflected to satisfy as fiction.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
From Booklist
Increasing incidents of school killings and growing numbers of adolescent murderers have spawned a new theme for novelists: the introspective probe into possible societal and familial causes. Goldman's second novel dissects one seemingly perfect family: father Peter, a successful attorney; mother and narrator Kathryne, a movie reviewer; and son Early, valedictorian at his prestigious private school. Early is arrested for murder the morning after graduation. Kathryne begins to scrutinize how she and Peter erred. Was it her fault for being the spoiling parent? Or was Peter the culprit, for withdrawing from parenting? She blames Early's friendship with a dominating underachiever; she blames herself for ignoring the pot in the glove compartment and the beer in the trunk. Or was the murder just a tragic ramification of a drug deal gone awry? Either way, Goldman's brutally honest dramatization of a dysfunctional family makes provocative reading. Deborah Donovan
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
See all Editorial Reviews
A mother goes to great lengths to defend her son in this slow-going, sentimental domestic tale with a racial spin. On the same night white student Early Smallwood delivers his high school’s commencement address, he shoots and kills a young black man in Charlotte, N.C., in 1987. His mother, first-person narrator Kathryne Smallwood, a movie critic for a local magazine and wife to a successful lawyer, Peter, proceeds to recount in exhaustive detail Early’s development from adored, overindulged only child and model pupil to accomplice to his delinquent childhood friend, Chip. Despite Kathryne’s anguished self-searching, however, there’s no convincing explanation for the valedictorian’s transformation into a murderer save that Early was in the wrong place in bad company. Poet and novelist Goldman (The Slow Way Back) strives to engage with complex racial questions, but her protagonist’s moral struggles are one-dimensional and dated as she struggles to reconcile her liberal self-image with her son’s act. At novel’s end, the Smallwoods remain bewildered by the changes around them, with Kathryne still wondering how she ended up "on the wrong side of a race issue." All too convincing as a study in self-delusion, this is too deliberate and uninflected to satisfy as fiction.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
From Booklist
Increasing incidents of school killings and growing numbers of adolescent murderers have spawned a new theme for novelists: the introspective probe into possible societal and familial causes. Goldman's second novel dissects one seemingly perfect family: father Peter, a successful attorney; mother and narrator Kathryne, a movie reviewer; and son Early, valedictorian at his prestigious private school. Early is arrested for murder the morning after graduation. Kathryne begins to scrutinize how she and Peter erred. Was it her fault for being the spoiling parent? Or was Peter the culprit, for withdrawing from parenting? She blames Early's friendship with a dominating underachiever; she blames herself for ignoring the pot in the glove compartment and the beer in the trunk. Or was the murder just a tragic ramification of a drug deal gone awry? Either way, Goldman's brutally honest dramatization of a dysfunctional family makes provocative reading. Deborah Donovan
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
See all Editorial Reviews
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Inside This Book Citations: This book cites 3 books Explore: Citations | Concordance | Text Stats Key Phrases - CAPs: Randolph Academy, Rock Hill, New York, Miss Neely, Steven Todd (more) Browse Sample Pages: Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover | Surprise Me! |
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Inside This Book
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First Sentence:
SOME MEMORIES we ignore. Read the first page Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Randolph Academy, Rock Hill, New York, Miss Neely, Steven Todd, Eddie Jackson, New Beginnings, New Orleans,
SOME MEMORIES we ignore. Read the first page Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Randolph Academy, Rock Hill, New York, Miss Neely, Steven Todd, Eddie Jackson, New Beginnings, New Orleans,