The Reformatory by Tananarive Due *****

 The Reformatory by Tananarive Due is set in 1950, Jim Crow Florida. Twelve-year-old Robert Stephens, Jr. defends his older sister Gloria from the unwanted advance of white Lyle McCormack. For kicking Lyle, he is sentenced to Gracetown School for Boys—a brutal place run by the psychopath Fenton Haddock. The brutality of the Jim Crow South is balanced by the nice people that Robert meets and the haints (ghosts) that befriend him. A novel about the United States in the 1950s, and well worth reading.

[Magic Realism] Like The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead, The Reformatory mixes elements of fantasy with realistic ones. Colson imagines the underground railroad as an actual subway system from the south to the north. Tananarive personifies Fenton Haddock’s past and guilt as haints—ghosts of the people murdered by Haddock. The haints have the power to change the mortal world. They can appear, move, steal, and even start fires.

The nice people included: David Loehmann (white) from Children’s Services in Tallahassee (A Jewish man from NYC); Miss Anne Powell (white), daughter of the late Councilman Powell; Lottie Mae Powell (black), Robert’s godmother; Mrs. Hamilton (black), music teacher at the Reformatory, John Dorsey, NAACP lawyer (“modeled loosely after my father”);

The Reformatory aka Gracetown School for Boys is a juvenile detention home inspired by the real-life Arthur G. Dozier School for Boys in Marianna, Fla.

Historical person (Wikipedia): Harry Tyson Moore (November 16, 1905 – December 25, 1951) was an African-American educator, a pioneer leader of the civil rights movement, founder of the first branch of the NAACP in Brevard County, Florida, and president of the state chapter of the NAACP.

Historical person (Wikipedia): Ruby McCollum, born Ruby Jackson (August 31, 1909 – May 23, 1992), was a wealthy married African-American woman in Live Oak, Florida, who is known for being arrested and convicted in 1952 for killing Dr. C. Leroy Adams, a prominent white doctor and state senator–elect. She testified as to their sexual relationship and his paternity of her child. The judge prohibited her from recounting her allegations of abuse by Adams. She was sentenced to death for his murder by an all-white jury. The sensational case was covered widely in the United States press (including a press report written by Zora Neale Hurston, as well as by international papers). McCollum was subjected to a gag order. Her case was appealed and overturned by the State Supreme Court.

Historical person (Wikipedia): Zora Neale Hurston (January 7, 1891  – January 28, 1960) was an American author, anthropologist, and filmmaker. She portrayed racial struggles in the early-20th-century American South and published research on hoodoo. The most popular of her four novels is Their Eyes Were Watching God, published in 1937. She also wrote over 50 short stories, plays, and essays.

Historical person (Wikipedia): Thoroughgood "Thurgood" Marshall (July 2, 1908 – January 24, 1993) was an American civil rights lawyer and jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1967 until 1991. He was the Supreme Court's first African-American justice. Prior to his judicial service, he was an attorney who fought for civil rights, leading the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund. Marshall was a prominent figure in the movement to end racial segregation in American public schools. He won 29 of the 32 civil rights cases he argued before the Supreme Court, culminating in the Court's landmark 1954 decision in Brown v. Board of Education, which rejected the separate but equal doctrine and held segregation in public education to be unconstitutional. President Lyndon B. Johnson appointed Marshall to the Supreme Court in 1967. A staunch liberal, he frequently dissented as the Court became increasingly conservative.

“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.