The Myth of Perpetual Summer

Early 1960s Mississippi is a center for change even as it grips tightly to the past, and 10-year-old Tallulah James and her family are buffeted by it. Trying to understand why her mother refuses to care for them as she takes off to march in rallies, and perplexed by a father whose moods swing unpredictably, Tallulah knows that she is responsible for her brothers and sister. Their grandmother, the keeper of family secrets, tries to be a steady force in their lives, and Tallulah's friends help as much as they can. But it is not enough; when she is 16, Tallulah walks away from it all. By 1972, she has forged a well-ordered life for herself in California. Thinking that she left her disastrous childhood behind in Mississippi, she watches a television broadcast of her brother's indictment for murder and realizes she must go home to save him. Told in alternating time lines, this complex novel takes teens who are willing to dig deeply into a family in crisis.