Blue Skies Red Birds and White Magnolias

<p>Sarah Crook a plantation owner’s wife and her best friend and neighbor Nita a black woman are as close as any friends<br />could ever be. Although the color of their skin is different they share the same sass the same can-do spirit and the same<br />loyalty to each another. Theirs is a friendship that defi es what is expected of a woman traditional Southern conventions<br />and the segregation of the time period. Yet their friendship lasts their whole lives through.<br />In many ways the two women are intertwined over the span of several generations. The arrival of Sherman’s army<br />changes their family dynamics. The Ku Klux Klan has an impact on their personal safety and livelihood. Education shapes<br />the future for their children and grandchildren and a lopsided system of justice leaves the future of some family members’<br />lives hanging in the balance.<br />Sarah’s granddaughter Holly is blind at birth. Nita’s granddaughter Neely becomes her playmate companion and<br />confi dant. Much like their grandmother the girls live in separate households but share a common spirit and an undying<br />frindship depending upon each other for support as they enter adulthood and face personal challenges.<br />When the Reverend Steven Canon a Northerner arrives in the rural North Carolina community of Saw Mill Cove he<br />sweeps Neely off her feet. Their relationship is out of the ordinary and troubled from the get-go. Steven has a secret that<br />he must keep hidden from others in order to be successful and he uses Neely as a means to an end.<br />After Grandmama Nita and Mama Tress catch wind of how the reverend has mistreated Neely they take matters into<br />their own hands. Grandmama and her friend Laura must appear before a grand jury while Mama Tress is tried not once but<br />twice for the reverend’s demise. But things aren’t on the up and up in Anson County; the justice system is fl awed. A sheriff<br />judge coroner surprise witness and clerk muddle the proceedings. As a result Tress becomes a scapegoat.<br />Once Neely is on her own free from Reverend Canon she has an opportunity to spread her wings in New York City.<br />She makes choices that allow her to be true to herself and fi nd contentment. From that point on the choices that she and<br />her daughter Lillian make in regard to the snake oil salesman named Steven Canon are risky and fi lled with drama.<br />Our Blue Skies Red Birds and White Magnolias chronicles four generations of strong women and proves what can<br />happen when a woman trusts her heart and mind to make a right decision.<br />—Paula M. Sheard Editor</p>