The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store by James McBride *****

The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store by James McBride begins in 1972 with the discovery of a skeleton in an abandoned well along with a pendant and some red threads. The murder investigation had barely started when Hurricane Agnes wiped away everything, thus closing the case. Still, the reader can’t help wondering about the skeleton’s identity and its murderer…who will not be apprehended.

The rest of the book goes back to 1925, to Chicken Hill, Pottstown, PA, the place where the Negroes, Jews, and immigrants are isolated from the white families who most claim to be descendants from the Mayflower. The book explores the subtle ways Pottstown’s underclass is marginalized, but it also celebrates their spirit, community, and ingenuity.

This is a book of many unforgettable characters. The is Chona, the Jewish proprietor of The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store. She extends credit to the people of Chicken Hill and friendship to their children. Her husband runs dances with Black and Jewish music and uses the profits to underwrite his wife’s generosity. Dodo is a twelve-year-old boy who is deaf, but brilliant. Paper, short for newspaper, was the source of news for the mostly illiterate residents of Chicken Hill. “Her beauty, her easy laughter, glimmering eyes, and instant smile for every stranger she met, made her a magnet for men. Men spilled their guts to her.”

Pottstown was run by and for powerful white men. The town closed for the annual KKK parade. “They forgot all the behaviors that, back home, could have you seeing your life flashing before your eyes as a noose was lowered around your neck—or worse, staring at iron bars for twenty years with your hopes flatter than yesterday’s beer, dreaming about old junk that you should’ve sold, or deer you should’ve shot but missed, or women you should have married and didn’t, having wandered face-first into the five-fingered karate chop of the white man’s laws. A colored person couldn’t survive in the white man’s world being ignorant. They had to know the news. That’s why Paper was so important. She was a Pottstown special.”

Warnings: Racism, antisemitism, rape, and abuse of inmates of a mental institution.

“As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.”

Check out https://amzn.to/3vfHVqc to see my books.

Check out https://amazon.com/shop/influencer-20171115075 for book recommendations.