The Davenports

The Davenports by Krystal Marquis 384 pages

Debut novelist Krystal Marquis has written an historical romance worthy of a Harlequin, a name synonymous with romance novels. She has written a work loosely based on the “real-life story of the C. R. Patterson family.”  Patterson was the first Black owner of first a carriage company, then a car company, based in Ohio.

Marquis shifts her story to Chicago in 1910 and gives readers a look into the lives of wealthy African Americans. The Davenports own a carriage company,  and they live in a luxurious home, complete with servants.

There are three teenagers in the house. All three of the children are expected to make good, wealthy marriages. The oldest daughter, Olivia, thinks she is in love with Jacob Lawrence. Her parent eagerly await news of their engagement. But once she meets Washington DeWight, a political activist, it’s love at first sight.

The middle child, John, is being groomed to take over the carriage company. He has dreams and desires to fade out the carriage company and replace it was a car company. He is not currently attached, but many of the young ladies in their societal sphere seek his attentions, including the maid, Amy-Rose, and Ruby, Olivia’s best friend.

Younger daughter, Helen, is a tomboy. She scoffs at romantic relationships, preferring be a mechanic and spend her days under the hoods of the latest horseless machines. And she’s good at it, really good at it. At her parents’ anniversary party, Cupid darts her with his arrow. The man she wants is strictly forbidden.

The book is told from three points of view: Olivia, Helen and Amy-Rose. The chapters are short, and, sometimes I was confused about whom was chasing, or wanted to chase, whom.

According to the back cover, this is “the first in a frothy, page-turning YA series set in turn of the last century Chicago and featuring an all-Black main cast.”  I don’t know if this means that Marquis will be writing sequels to “The Davenports” or if other authors will have books set during this time. 

I enjoyed reading “The Davenports,” even though romance novels are not my preferred genre. I loved the history and the escapades that the characters found themselves embroiled in. “The Davenports” receives 4 out of 5 stars in Julie’s world.

 

Wild Women and the Blues

 Wild Women and the Blues by Denny S. Bryce 384 pages

I knew from the minute I saw the cover of the book that I wanted to read it. I find the 1920s period fascinating. I was hooked from the first page and didn’t want to put it down.

The books starts in 2015. Sawyer Hayes goes to visit 110-year-old Honoree Dalcour in her Chicago nursing home. She is the last living link to famed African-American movie director Oscar Micheaux. The fact that Oscar is a real forgotten Hollywood legend endeared me more to this story, and I spent an afternoon researching him (thank heavens for the internet!).

Sawyer thinks he has found a bit of lost film history---a snippet of a film from the 1920s that stars Honoree---in his grandmother’s long-ago box. Mostly, Sawyer is working in Paris with his dad, waiting for the film snippet to be restored and trying to finish his doctorate in media studies.

Honoree is guarded by one of the nurses, Lula. He smooth talks his way into see Honoree, and it doesn’t hurt that his grandmother has been paying the bills at Chicago’s Bronzeville Senior Living Facility since 1985. Honoree is a rather ornery old woman. She may be ancient, but she is still mentally alert and feisty. She loves to give Sawyer a hard time, questioning and accusing him at every opportunity.

The novels moves back and forth between 2015 and 1925, also in Chicago, and shifts from Sawyer’s point of view to Honoree’s. There readers are immersed in Honoree’s life and her ambitions, along with seedy bars, dancing girls and yes, gangsters. To start, she is a dancer at Miss Hattie’s…a seedy joint with its share of fascinating characters. Her dream, though, is to dance at the Dreamland Café…and that dream may be in reach.

But a lot happens to try to stop Honoree. The man she has always loved and disappeared from her life three years ago, Ezekiel, reappears. She has also become the quasi-guardian to the most innocent young woman she has ever met, Bessie Palmer.

Things really heat up when Honoree witnesses a murder at Miss Hattie’s. Now she not only has all those other things to worry about, but she has to keep a low profile to stay a step ahead of the Capone gang.

Author Bryce’s debut novel is a quick read. I look forward to more novels by her. I wish there had been more about Oscar Micheaux...something at the end. That would have deepened the story a lot...for me. Therefore, “Wild Women and the Blues” receives 4 out of 5 stars in Julie’s world.

Mama Black Widow

Mama Black Widow by Iceberg Slim    245 pages

Iceberg Slim knew Otis Tilson, a black homosexual man who's story he tells here.    Otis started out life on a plantation with his parents, his brother and his twin sisters, working hard for the white folks that owned it.   When his mother's cousin Bunny invites them to move to Chicago and offers to help them get an apartment in her building and pay them some for helping care for her (she is older and not in perfect health), Otis' Mama jumps at the chance and so his part-time preacher father went along with it to please his wife.   What they found when they got there was a tenement with a white slum lord landlady who lied and cheated people and was friends with the local beat cops so they would back her dishonest dealings up and never take the world of a black person.   Assaults were frequent, thugs ran the neighborhood, on the streets, drink, drugs and prostitution were rampant.  Crime was every where.and so were freaky molesters who felt no sorrow in abusing the young.   Iceberg Slim tells a sad tale brilliantly.  He takes you into the mind of Otis' mother who hated white people with reason her past will show but her love for money and fine things led her to fatally subject innocent lives to fates they should not have had.   Brilliant book.   Very, very  brutal and sad but so touching sharing the lives of this man and his family if briefly you will be glad you read it.   Excellent job, Iceberg Slim.    I would recommend this book to mature teens because of the adult content and graphic depictions of murder scenes and sexual content.

 - Shirley J.

An American Summer: Love and Death in Chicago

An American Summer: Love and Death in Chicago by Alex Kotlowitz   304 pages 

Kotlowitz, the author of There Are No Children Here, revisits Chicago over a summer to write about the individuals affected by violence. Told through intimate profiles of people, Kotlowitz talks to and writes about people who have committed acts of violence, social workers, teachers, and many more.

I had read There Are No Children Here pretty recently and had been eagerly anticipating this new book from the author.  He cites that over the past 20 years in Chicago, 14,033 people have been killed and another roughly 60,000 wounded by gunfire.  What he does in this book is look beyond those statistics and examine what this kind of violence does to the spirit of individuals and their community. Kotlowitz has a great way of helping tell people's stories without making it seem like they should be pitied; instead, what he shows is how many people have commonalities and how violence can have a devastating impact that creates a ripple effect through communities.  I found this book to be interesting and thought-provoking.  Coming from the Chicago area and living in different neighborhoods in Chicago, I feel ties to Chicago; however, I am not proud of all of Chicago's history, nor its current state.  What I appreciated was that Kotlowitz brings a completely human aspect into all of these news stories and statistics.  It's a sobering read.

High-Risers: Cabrini-Green and the Fate of American Public Housing

High-Risers: Cabrini-Green and the Fate of American Public Housing by Ben Austen    400 pages

The Cabrini-Green public housing was one of the more famous public housing in the United States. While not the only public housing in Chicago, Cabrini-Green had the most notorious reputation. Built in the 1940s in an area that had previously been a deteriorating slum, Cabrini-Green grew to 23 towers and a population of 20,000 (although that number could be debated) that was packed onto 70 blocks. Typical of Chicago, this area was just blocks from one of Chicago's most expensive neighborhoods, the Gold Coast (where the high rises actually had some similar elements of construction). For many people who lived in Cabrini, it was home, even as it became synonymous with crime and the failure of government. By 2011, every one of the high rise buildings had been razed and the families dispersed.  In this book, Ben Austen tells the story of Cabrini-Green, but also tells the story of public housing in America, Chicago politics, government politics, and more. He includes personal accounts of people who lived in these buildings, following their lives through the years.

I found this book to be beautifully written and absolutely fascinating. Growing up in the Chicago area and living in several Chicago neighborhoods in my 20s, I was very familiar with Cabrini-Green, as well as the other public housing projects in Chicago. These particular high-rises, visible as you drove down Lake Shore Drive, were foreboding looking, even on a sunny day.  It was hard to imagine that any of these buildings had ever looked nice or had been good places to live. The reputation of the buildings was absolutely horrible, as well, making the name "Cabrini Green" synonymous with danger, crime, and awfulness. If you mention the name Dantrell Davis to people in Chicago, or "Girl X," anyone of a certain age will know what you're talking about. I remember Cabrini-Green. I remember Girl X. I remember feeling nervous when I was driving by this housing project. I remember being nervous when a family member started working in the 600 W. Chicago Avenue building, basically right across the street. Their employer said things like, "Don't worry. Just walk on the one side of the street," as if somehow, there was a protective barrier to keep everyone safe. I also remember when the decision was made to tear these buildings down. There was a sense of relief, but also a sense of sadness. And worry for where these people would go, because these buildings were homes. Just because these buildings were in bad repair and bad condition didn't mean that the people didn't deserve somewhere to live.

I really appreciated how the author delved into the history of not just these buildings, but of public housing in general (and even mentions the Pruitt-Igoe buildings in St. Louis). This is the really ugly history of Chicago, and Chicago politics. I admit I am proud to be from Chicago, but I also admit that I am not proud of some of Chicago's history (and even what happens there now). The author, however, doesn't focus on the ugliness. Instead, you have the cold reality and the awfulness, but you also have the balance with the stories of people who lived in these buildings. They raised their families there, worked hard, supported their community, and believed in the potential of what could be.  I had a hard time putting this book down, and would suggest it to readers who are interested in this view of history (even if they don't know much about Chicago).  If you are familiar with Chicago's history, I'd encourage you to pick up this book. You may find it brings up some memories you had forgotten, and may bring up some emotion, too. It's history that shouldn't be forgotten.

One of the Cabrini-Green buildings

Devil in the White City

The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair that Changed America by Erik Larson, 390 pages

The Columbian Exposition of 1893 - the Chicago World's Fair - was a historical landmark, defining a nation and an era in the same manner as the 1851 London Great Exhibition and 1889 Paris Exposition Universalle.  Timed to commemorate the 400th anniversary of Columbus' discovery of the New World, the Fair looked towards the future as much as the past, its monumental neo-classical buildings painted stark white and illuminated at night by tens of thousands of electric lights, forming an ideal "White City", an attainable future of unimpeded progress.  As Erik Larson relates, however, the real contemporary city formed a contrasting "Black City" of stockyards, smokestacks, and slaughterhouses, shady figures and dark streets which swallowed people whole.  In the midst of this Chicago squatted the misshapen "castle" of Herman Mudgett, also known as HH Holmes or a galaxy of other aliases, a conman and serial murderer.

Larson divides his narrative largely between Holmes and Daniel Burnham, the architect who, more than anyone else, shaped the Fair.  Frederick Law Olmstead, who designed the landscaping, George Washington Ferris, who designed the famous Wheel, and Sol Bloom, who managed the Midway, all receive due attention as well, and Larson interweaves their threads skillfully to complement Burnham's story and fill in the broader tapestry of the Fair.  Less interesting are the chapters dedicated to Patrick Pendergast, a disappointed, delusional office seeker and assassin, who is either too prominent or not prominent enough, distracting from other narratives without yielding any real insight.  

The greatest difficulty Larson faces is Holmes.  An inveterate liar, conman, polygamist, and sociopath, much of Holmes' life remains mysterious, with even known facts colored by rumor and supposition.  A writer must be careful in separating reality from fantasy.  Disappointingly, Larson does not engender confidence in this regard, even reimagining a scene from Holmes' childhood to equip him with a Lecter-grade cold, intimidating stare.  Further undermining the reader's trust are some bald errors - Mary Kelly, last of the canonical victims of Jack the Ripper, was not pregnant at the time of her murder.  Thankfully, Larson regains some measure of skepticism before the end of the book, lest Holmes appear to be the only predator in 1893 Chicago.

There may be better books about the Columbian Exposition - Harold Schechter's Depraved is certainly a better book about Holmes.  What The Devil in the White City does so well is telling the stories in parallel, allowing similarities to emerge without ostentatiously drawing attention to them.  Burnham and Holmes were men of their time, like many others drawn to Chicago as a city on the move, where a man could be whoever he wanted to be.  Each struggled and strived to live that dream or nightmare.

The Ghost of Alcatraz: The Autobiography of Former Alcatraz Inmate #1076

The Ghost of Alcatraz: The Autobiography of Former Alcatraz Inmate #1076 by John Dekker  127 pages

What could be better than a ghost story set on “The Rock,” the infamous Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary?  Not much in my book.  When I saw this slim memoir in a Pier 39 gift shop, I immediately grabbed it.

I knew by looking reading that the first few lines that the story wouldn’t be well written. But I was pulled in by the dedication to his wife, Linda.

John Dekker was from Chicago where he grew up during the Great Depression. He was a tough kid with tough friends and tough relatives. His pulled his first caper to get his hands on $1,000, a heck of a lot of money in those days. He needed it to bail his father out of jail.  It was easy, it was fast, and it accomplished his goal. Thus, a criminal was born into the body of a teenager. The story is told in Dekker’s own words. He did a great job with description and creating conflict. One thing you can say about Dekker, he was loyal.

The first half of the book is a setup for Dekker’s ultimate destination, Alcatraz. The descriptions of the life during the time he spent there, 1953-1958, reveal a hellhole. Punctuated by a recent visit, Dekker drew vivid pictures of his life on The Rock. He served his time and was released in 1958.

As far as the ghost went, well, I’m not sure what Dekker was trying to convey. I was thinking literally, but no ghost story was told. I was disappointed, but nonetheless fascinated by Dekker and his life choices. Another thing that disappointed me was that he never mentioned his age at the time of the his crimes, when he was transferred to Alcatraz not when he was released. 

After his release, he settled in California. He returned often and attended many of the reunions. I find it odd that the inmates and guards held reunion, much like high schools and colleges. That seems plain ol’ weird to me.

I tried to find Dekker on Google, I wanted to know more about him and if he is still alive, but alas, I couldn’t find any information. I “think” he was alive as late as 2004, but after that, well, I’m just not sure. I bet whoever is reading this can come up with all kinds of fascinating information, and if you do, please let me know.

Although the title is misleading, the style that of a tenth grader, I still found The Ghost of Alcatraz: The Autobiography of Former Alcatraz Inmate #1076 to be a fascinating read. I give it 6 out of 5 stars.

Brush Back

Brush Back by Sara Paretsky
459 Pages

"Chicago's V. I. Warshawski confronts crooked politicians and buried family secrets in the gritty new novel from New York Times-bestselling author Sara Paretsky. No one would accuse V. I. Warshawski of backing down from a fight, but there are a few she'd be happy to avoid. High on that list is tangling with Chicago political bosses. Yet that's precisely what she ends up doing when she responds to Frank Guzzo's plea for help. For six stormy weeks back in high school, V.I. thought she was in love with Frank. He broke up with her, she went off to college, he started driving trucks for Bagby Haulage. She forgot about him until the day his mother was convicted of bludgeoning his kid sister, Annie, to death. Stella Guzzo was an angry, uncooperative prisoner and did a full twenty-five years for her daughter's murder. Newly released from prison, Stella is looking for exoneration, so Frank asks V.I. for help. V.I. doesn't want to get involved. Stella hated the Warshawskis, in particular V.I.'s adored mother, Gabriella. But life has been hard on Frank and on V.I.'s other childhood friends, still stuck on the hardscrabble streets around the dead steel mills, and V.I. agrees to ask a few questions. Those questions lead her straight into the vipers' nest of Illinois politics she's wanted to avoid. When V.I. takes a beating at a youth meeting in her old hood, her main question becomes whether she will live long enough to find answers."

Paretsky always writes an engaging series and this book will be popular with fans of the series and mystery lovers.  There are a few spots that get a little muddled but overall a fast and enjoyable read.

Governor's Wife

The Governor's Wife by Michael Harvey
237 Pages

"When Illinois Gov. Raymond Perry is sentenced to prison for fraud and racketeering, he enters an elevator in Chicago's Dirksen Building and disappears. Soon afterward, PI and ex-cop Michael Kelly gets an anonymous email offering him $200,000 to find Perry, no questions asked. Naturally, he begins with Mrs. Perry, an enigma who fears that her husband is dead. Further probing, with help from a cop friend, leads to a mysterious construction conglomerate where Kelly is violently warned off. It appears that a shadowy political cabal is behind a decades-long skimming of road construction funds with the governor so much involved that $60 million has gone missing with him. The ruthless pols are eliminating anyone involved while they pressure Kelly to find the money."

Harvey's books are similar to Michael Connelly and early Robert Parker.  I highly recommend any in his series.  The only fault I have with the book is that it is too short.

Pieces And Players

Pieces And Players by Blue Balliet, 306 pages

This book brings together several characters from previous books to help solve the mystery of the stolen art from the Farmer Museum.  Thirteen pieces of art were stolen and no one knows how but Calder, Petra, and Tommy have experience in this area.  With the help of Zoomy and Early, they plan to solve the mystery and recover the art.  They may be only thirteen, but they’re smart and resourceful.  I liked the book.  Kids that like realistic fiction about kids who can get things done will enjoy this book and probably Balliet’s other books as well.

A Groovy Kind of Love

A Groovy Kind of Love by Karen Wojcik Berner  316 pages

I was a little nervous about reading A Groovy Kind of Love. It’s the third and final book in “The Bibliophiles” series.  I have the other two, only they haven’t gotten to the top of my pile. Then I read, somewhere that they are stand-alone novels with a common theme: the protagonists belong to a book club. And as best I can tell, it isn’t even the same book club. An interesting concept.

A Groovy Kind of Love is a character-driven novel. The first part of the novel give background info on the protagonists. Thaddeus Mumblegarden IV is a timid and meek child. He’d rather read than breathe. However, his father is a stereotypical dad, forcing the young man into baseball. Thaddeus is good at it, he becomes the team’s star pitcher. Dad has such an influence on the child’s life that Thaddeus studies computer programming rather than English Literature when it comes time to go to college.

On the other hand, Spring Pearson is the daughter of free-spirited hippie parents who run Ambrosia, a smoothie establishment. Spring also loves to read. The book jacket talks of Spring having an older sister, but if she was mentioned, it wasn’t memorable. Spring loves to read too, but the fun in her part of the background info is watching her become more confident in her business abilities, and moving more and more to running the store on her own.

In the novel’s Part Two, Thaddeus and Spring meet in a book club, fall in love, and get married. I can’t talk any more about this section because it would spoil the story.

A Groovy Kind of Love is a fast, quick read with short chapters, and I couldn’t stop reading. I’m giving this novel 4 out of 5 stars for two reasons: First, there could have been less Part One and more Part Two. That’s where the real plot and drama are.  If I read Part One quickly, then I devoured Part Two. Second, the title of the book is a song title. I get the title after reading the book, but it seems like a long shot to me.