A tweet from Ms. Terry McMillan advising another person to definitely pick up a copy of Tayari Jones 3rd novel, Silver Sparrow, has spurred me on to get this review out for my readers:)
The story is set in 1980’s Atlanta & centers around a Southern family caught up in the drama of lies, loves and emotional breakthroughs, due, entirely to decisions grownups make. At the age of 5, Dana Lynn is excited to show the picture she’d drawn at school for her teacher to James Witherspoon, her father. Her fathers’ reaction to seeing the two sets of families in young Dana’s drawings, however, only baffles the young girl. She, after all, knows about Chaurisse, his other daughter and her sister, so what’s the problem?
She soon learns the ugly words used to describe her family’s existence. Dana’s father is a bigamist and young Dana Lynn is the “secret”. The author’s clever pairing of the sisters encounters- planned entirely by Dana and unbeknownst to Chaurisse, the fathers’ “legitimate” daughter,moves the characters along in a gripping series of events that will have the reader wondering what’s going to happen next.
The story is told through the eyes of both sisters, which makes for an interesting perspective on how children handle crisis. It also begs to ask the question? How far should adults go in keeping secrets as a means to protect their children? Tayari Jones Silver Sparrow has been compared to a Toni Morrison‘s The Bluest Eye. A professor at Columbia University, Farah Jasmine Griffin said in an interview profile of the author’s work “Scholars are starting to recognize that Southern Writers are also global writers”
After reading Ms. Jones latest book, I’d have to agree:) Tayari Jones blogs at Tayari Jones.Com
Clara54would like to thank Algoquin Books for providing a copy of Silver Sparrow for review…
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