In the backwoods of Mississippi, a land of honeysuckle and grapevine, Jewel and her husband, Leston, are truly blessed; they have five fine children. When Brenda Kay is born in 1943, Jewel gives thanks for a healthy baby, last-born and most welcome. Jewel is the story of how quickly a life can change; how, like lightning, an unforseen event can set us on a course without reason or compass. In this story of a woman's devotion to the child who is both her burden and God's singular way of smiling on her, Bret Lott has created a mother-daughter relationhip of matchless intensity and beauty, and one of the finest, most indominitable heroines in contemporary American fiction.
This is quite the saga. We meet Jewel when young and follow her as she marries, has children, persuades her husband to move from Mississippi to California to obtain the best education she can for her Down Syndrome daughter, and all in all become quite a force in her family's life.
Brenda Kay is born in 1943, the youngest of six. Not much was known about Down Syndrome at the time (Brenda Kay was called a "Mongoloid Idiot" and her family encouraged to put her into an institution) but Jewel is the kind of mother we meet at all times. She is determined that her child will have the best life possible for however long she lives, and she is willing to overturn heaven and earth to get it.
I am always interested in how well the author portrays someone with a specific condition. I wasn't convinced that Lott had Brenda Kay right. Her manner of speaking is rather telegraphic, lacking in articles. It's true, from what I read, that Down Syndrome people generally speak less complex sentences but their main difficulty is actually physical: the difficulty in making the sounds.
Brenda Kay's attitude is often portrayed as "empty", as if she does not grasp what she is seeing or hearing and so tunes it out. I don't believe this is correct, either, from what I have read. As I understand it, a person with Down Syndrome is not stupid or unobservant but rather just slower to put things together. Of course there is a spectrum of cases that all fall under this label and we can imagine that Brenda Kay is reasonably well-functioning as compared to those who never are able to do basic things.
Ultimately I liked Jewel well enough and appreciated the effort she put into her family and her marriage. It is a story from another time in that sense.
This is an engaging story of a family and everything they endure. Really liked it.
awesome! awesome! awesome tale of a mother's never-ending love for her child! very inspiring and sometimes tearful!
An Oprah Book and NYT Bestseller. In the backwoods of Mississippi, Jewel and her husband are blessed with five fine children. When Brenda Kay is born, Jewel's life quickly changes and a mother-daughter relationship of matchless intensity and beauty is born. Characters are compared to those by Steinbeck and Harper Lee.
I just LOVED this book...and I'm pretty picky!!
In the backwoods of Mississippi, Jewel and her husband are truly blessed; they have five fine children. When Brenda Kay is born in 1943, Jewel gives thanks for a healthy baby, last-born and most welcome. Jewel is the story of how quckly a life can change; how an unforeseen event can set us on a course without reason or compass. In this story of a woman's devotion to the child who is both her burden and God's singular way of smiling on her, Bret Lott has created a mother-daughter relationship of marchles intensity and beauty, and one of the finest, most indomitable heroines in contemporary American fiction.
I just couldn't get into this book. It moved VERY slow. I read about the first three chapters and decided to post it because it didn't hold my attention. Maybe it just wasn't what I thought it was going to be.
