Alexandra Styron
All The Finest Girls
Back Bay Books - Reprint
2002
In this debut novel, a white character--Addy--takes a kind of a time-out from life after her own illness and the death of a black woman, Louise, who had cared for her as a child. She flies to St. Claire and stays with Louise's family for the funeral. They warily accept her presence and, during her visit, Addy gets to know Louise through them in a way that her childhood self-absorption had never allowed.
I found this to be a somewhat odd book, although I did enjoy it. The book jacket states that it is "beautifully controlled". I'd have to agree with that--the book does feel somewhat restrained. There are no exhuberant epiphanies, just a kind of quiet enlightenment, the effects of which are mostly left to the imagination of the reader.
While this book could stand as a good example of how members of one group of people marginalize others by stereotyping, perhaps the best way to look at this one is as an example of maturing young adults come to appreciate their elders as people in a broader context than their younger selves could comprehend.
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