Barb's Bookshelf: Kay and Jiles
Barb Moore

Terry Kay, one of Georgia's favorite authors and a 2006 inductee into the Georgia Writers Hall of Fame, has just released his newest novel, " The Book of Marie." Kay has presented this book in a new style for him, both in first person and third person perspective.

The story revolves around the fiftieth reunion of the Overton High School class of 1955. Cole Bishop receives his invitation to the reunion, and in it is a postscript asking for information about another classmate, Marie Fitzpatrick. Marie came into Cole's life during his senior year at Overton, in 1954. He was a native-born Southerner, captain of the football team; she, a transplant from Washington, D.C. Marie was very metropolitan, a freethinker, and had bold predictions about the changes that would occur with the onslaught of desegregation. She would shock the school and the town. The two form an odd and tender friendship that final school year. This friendship continues after high school in the form of letters written back and forth over the years. As Cole now prepares for his 50th class reunion, he is asked by Tanya Berry, his friend and counselor, to write about Marie. It will help set his memories straight, and if he had the memories straight, he could follow them back to some understanding. So, we begin the story of Marie, and how she shaped his life.

"Stormy Weather" is Paulette Jiles' second novel to date. It takes place during the Great Depression, when Oil was king in Texas. The Stoddard girls, Mayme, the oldest and responsible one, Jeanine, the intelligent tomboy, and Bea, the youngest who dreams of being a writer, are pulled from small town to small town. Their father, Jack Stoddard, hauls equipment for the oil fields, and enjoys horse racing and cards. Their mother, Elizabeth, tries to make each temporary house a warm and happy home. But when in 1937 drought and dust storms and a terrible accident sink the family's fortunes, they must return to the abandoned family farm.

This is a story of coming of age during our nation's worst economic times, and portrays what life was like for this Texas family, trying to hold on to everything that is slipping away. We've all heard the stories of those terrible times, and Paulette Jiles brings our history to vivid life.-- Barb Moore is assistant manager at Franklin Memorial Library.

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