Skip to main content

Out of the Easy


Out of the Easy is set in 1950s French Quarter, New Orleans.  The protagonist, like the city she inhabits, has her own dark specters whose source and spring is her prostitute mother.  Wanting to flee this mire and the stigma it carries, Josie devises a plan to get out.  Unfortunately, the sins of the mother are visited upon the daughter in the form a mob entanglement that threatens all that Josie values.  Yet, with the help of her friends, Josie emerges triumphant and acts upon the wisdom and courage that she’s gleaned from literary classics, taking this new understanding with her as she heads East.  Sepetys’ sophomore novel has not only a compelling plot, but also a narrative voice that rings true as the protagonist is forced to exist in a world that repulses her – code-switching between the seediness of a clandestine economy of favors and a burgeoning self-refinement.  In coming of age, Josie matures morally, psychologically, and socially matures as the result of her extraordinary experience; she must learn to reconcile her desperation to escape with her stalwart loyalty to those who have always sheltered her from her mother’s storm.  This novel will appeal to readers who enjoy realistic fiction’s tendency to recognize and navigate the pluralities of life as well as those language lovers who revel in the colorful musicality of southernisms à la Eudora Welty, Truman Capote, and Tennessee Williams.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Decloaking Wakanda: Creating Space for BIPOC Nerds

On February 9, 2023, at the fourth Joint Conference of Librarians of Color (JCLC), I had the exhilarating experience of guiding a discussion that focused on the need to connect with nerd culture and create a welcoming environment for the BIPOC fandom. The soul of this session had been several years in the making and built on countless heart-to-heart moments. So, I couldn’t imagine a better venue for seeing it actualized than my first JCLC. Furthermore, for this session, I had the honor of being in conversation with fellow nerds and comics librarians Jean Darnell and Deimosa Webber-Bey . To my eternal amazement, our talk was met with a standing room only reception, and afterward we were repeatedly regaled with tales of being turned away at the door. In hopes of capturing a small portion of that day's magic, this post grew out of that discussion. *** For the past 30 years, BIPOC nerds have existed in the cringe-worthy shadow of Urkel. What if, instead, they’d had portrayals such as ...
1 comment
Read more

BIMM, DIMM, and PIT - Oh My!

Sara Pavone and Christina Taylor, the RRHS librarians, used a combination of different technologies to introduce the logistics of digital copyright protection to students in BIMM, DIMM, and PIT. This lesson marked the maiden voyage of the iPads that the library received as part of the Next Generation Digital Classroom (NGDC) initiative. Mrs. Pavone and Mrs. Taylor combined the tablets with Blendspace , Google Drive , and WeVideo to provide a lesson that not only engaged the students but also allowed teachers to differentiate the instruction to meet students’ needs. Finally, because the entire lesson was platform agnostic, using online tools, students were able to work at their own pace...beyond the confines of the physical classroom...from anywhere they had Internet access. Many students commented that they enjoyed the lesson and thought it was a lot better than last year’s, which was not nearly as interactive nor heavy in technology. **This post was originally published on the  R...
Post a Comment
Read more

Where the Sidewalk Ends

Although published in crisp black and white, former  Playboy  correspondent Silverstein’s classic collection of poems and drawings  Where the Sidewalk Ends  fairly explodes with colorful language of the kid-friendly sort. Taken by themselves, the poems range in length from a handful of lines up to three pages, and in breadth from a single amusing thought to a narrative arc or a song’s worth of lyrics. Common childhood themes of disobedience to parental and educational authority, trouble with siblings, chores and fanciful play are addressed in a characteristically irreverent manner, with frequent digressions into pure fantasy and fun. Never crossing over into the excessively precious or maudlin, Silverstein prefers to stick to a more self-conscious and unsentimental tone, gleefully exploring the macabre and outright disgusting topics frequented by children. On nearly every last opening, the text of the verses shares space with Silverstein’s expressive and loos...
Post a Comment
Read more