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Title: Her Own Place: A Novel by Dori Sanders ISBN: 0-449-90875-5 Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 01 May, 1994 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $11.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 3 (3 reviews)
Rating: 1
Summary: Boring and Plotless
Comment: This is the story of Mae Lee Barnes. Mae Lee marries a man who goes to be a soldier. She faithfully writes him, though he doesn't write her a single letter back. He comes home from the military and fathers her firstborn. Then he leaves for prolonged periods with no sufficient explanation, returning every now and then to father yet another child until Mae Lee has a total of five kids. Then her husband skips town for good. She buys a farm and manages it, along with raising her five kids.
And that's where any semblance of plot ends.
The rest of the book is spent describing how behind-the-times Mae Lee is. She spends many pages fretting about her grandson's earring, and how he must be gay because he wears an earring. After much angst and drama over such an issue, she finally comes to term with the earring. She volunteers at a local hospital. She eats dinner at the other volunteers' homes. She invites them to eat at her home. She rides in a plane for the first time. She rides a bus a lot.
Exciting - Not. There is little-to-no plot in this book. If you took any person and wrote down everything they do in their life, from waking up in the morning to going to bed at night, you'd note that 99% of their day was mundane and not worth writing about. Unfortunately, this author thought that 99% was worth writing about. She tried to make something of small details not worth noting, and she dragged these details out.
The protagonist is an ignorant, perpetually pregnant wife who I can't sympathize with a bit. The book is virtually completely lacking in plot. The dialogue is dull. The characters are unbelievable. This is one to pass on.
Rating: 5
Summary: Wonderful, inspirational folksy read.
Comment: A friend who lives in South Carolina recommended this author to me and I must thank her here. Thanks, Angie! What an engaging story written with such simple, easy to read style.
I came away with respect and awe for the main character, Mae Lee Barnes, who raised five children without the help of a husband OR welfare or food stamps. Mae Lee's mother and father instilled in her the value of hard work and saving money and she became a land owner in a time when few blacks owned land---much less a black woman with five children. This book is the intriguing story of her life. Very enjoyable, uplifting read!
Rating: 3
Summary: This is the way it was. Really.
Comment: Is is possible for a black Southerner - or a white one - to write without predjudice? Apparently it is, and Dori Sanders has done so. She has no axe to grind, just a good story to tell about growing up on a black farm in South Carolina in the years that encompass (but do not end with) World War II and the beginnings of the Civil Rights movement. Just when you thought you knew "how it was", here comes a different slant: Mae Lee (like Dori Sanders herself) is unusual for a Southern black woman, in that she owns her farm -- not that that solves her problems.
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Title: Clover by Dori Sanders ISBN: 0449906248 Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 01 May, 1994 List Price(USD): $11.95 |
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Title: Dori Sanders' Country Cooking: Recipes and Stories from the Family Farm Stand by Dori Sanders, John Willoughby ISBN: 1565121171 Publisher: Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill Pub. Date: 01 October, 1995 List Price(USD): $18.95 |
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