BEFORE WE WERE YOURS
By LISA WINGATE
I remember it was around 1:00 am when I turned the last
page.
I can’t remember if I was sucked
in initially but, regardless of how this one started…it became one of those
books I couldn’t wait to finish…and yet...didn’t want it to end.
The book is told in two narrative strands, past and
present. One of a woman looking into a
mysterious past; and the other of a child looking ahead to an uncertain future.
It created a drama that was both bleak and optimistic. It showed resilience and redemption.
It was uniquely human.
Avery is a woman finding her roots, while Rill is a girl
afraid of losing hers. Two generations
apart…forever changed by a heartbreaking injustice…a real-life scandal.
Georgia Tann and her Memphis Tennessee Children’s Home
Society orphanage cast aside children for profit…
pure f*ck*ng evil.
I can’t help question how a place like this
could actually exist. How could she do
this? How did she sleep at night?
But
she did…for years.
All the while…robbing
children of their pasts and changing their futures.
Memphis, Tennessee….1939 on the
Mississippi River shanty, the Arcadia.
Five siblings live…to me…what seems like a magical life aboard a river shanty
boat. Their days are filled with
laughter…fishing…telling stories…running free through the wild.
The story was so rich with details I could smell the river, hear
the laughter…and once that was taken away…I could hear the creaking of the floor
boards in the orphanage and feel the pain of loss.
The power of money and
politics. It still exists today.
As the book went on and the stories
unfolded…I thought about all of the lies…the secrets. Does anyone really know their own
parents? Do we really know our
friends? What questions do you ask? What secrets does the person beside you in
the elevator have…the person in line with you at the grocery store?
It awakens
your senses…your curiosity and your wonder…but do you dare? I mean…do we really
even want to know? Should some truths be
left undiscovered? Should some secrets
stay hidden inside Pandora’s box?
Stolen children subjected to
horrors, a father with cancer, a grandmother with Alzheimer’s, an elderly woman
whose sister dies and remains living with the body until discovered...
It’s a
dark story to read at times…but in the very end…they find a little light.
In my opinion, it is definitely
worth your time if you appreciate learning some history through engaging
fiction.
Peter Pan said, ‘All the world is made of faith, and trust,
and pixie dust.”
IF ONLY…
yet, certainly not in this case.
