★ 08/27/2021
Luesse (Missing Isaac) unfolds another beautiful story of poverty, community, and love in the Southern United States. The students in Luesse's fictional Cajun community of Bernadette, LA, despise school. It's an understandable emotion when out-of-town teachers refuse to teach Cajun history and heritage and even hit students with rulers or take away privileges if they're caught speaking French. When starry-eyed Ellie Fields arrives to teach in Bernadette, she is shocked by many things: alligators in the bayou, one teacher for all grades—but mostly the prejudice against her bilingual, Catholic students. Politicians and remote school boards view Bernadette, a town without indoor plumbing or electricity, as backwards, but its radical hospitality for neighbors proves this small town is more forward-thinking than most. As Ellie gets to know Bernadette, she finds the courage to stand up to corruption using the "bayou attitude" that privileges a person's skills—how well they sing, dance, play music, cook—over the color of their skin or the identity of their parents. VERDICT Luesse's latest will have huge cross-over appeal for general fiction readers. Hand it to fans of Lisa Wingate's The Book of Lost Friends and Susie Finkbeiner's Stories That Bind Us.—Christine Barth, Scott Cty. Lib. Syst., IA
