The Myth of Perpetual Summer

The Myth of Perpetual Summer by Susan Crandall  368 pages

Not long ago I wrote a review for Joanne Bischof’s Sons of Blackbird Mountain. I call it the first “must read” of 2018. Well, I just found the second “must read” of the year, The Myth of Perpetual Summer, and probably the best beach read I’ve ever come across. To quote the back cover, “A struggling girl uncovers her family’s history and sees how the lies of the past echo throughout their dysfunctional lives today.”

It sounds cliché to say that this novel about family and the secrets they harbor is haunting, powerful and beautifully writer, but those are the best words to describe this story. It’s Southern gothic at it’s finest.

The story starts in August 1972 in San Francisco. Tallulah James has just learned that her brother, Walden, had been arrested for murder in New Orleans. Readers may think this is going to be about Walden, but it’s really about Tallulah. All she knows is that she must get home to him, a home that she left nine years ago and has not been in contact with her family since.

The story revolves around Tallaluah’s growing up in Lamoyne, Mississippi with her two brothers, sister, parents, and grandmother. Chapter Two shifts back to 1958 Lamoyne. Her parents are largely absent, and she feels the weight of raising her twin younger siblings, not to mention making sure the family’s reputation doesn’t get any more smeared than it already is. Her dad is a professor at the local college, and her mother is more interested in “causes” than in child-rearing. Their explosive relationship plays havoc on the entire family. The matriarch of the family, is the Southern-to-the-bone grandmother, who does her best to guard the family’s secrets and.

There is some beautiful writing in this novel, and here are a few lines that I just adored:

            “…everyone knows that is brains were leather, Grayson wouldn’t have enough to saddle a June bug.)”

            “He knows more hiding places in this town than a stray cat.”

            “I will the storm to take is time as the grumbling sky argues for a faster arrival.”

            “The anew quickly spread to Margo, a forest fire hopping from tree to tree.”

But then betrayal and death shake Tallaluah to the core.

I have never read Crandall before, but I’m sure gonna get some of her books. The Myth of Perpetual Summer receives 6 out of 5 stars in Julie’s world.