Product Description

In the backwoods of Mississippi, Jewel and her husband Leston are blessed with five healthy children. All this changes with the birth of Brenda Kay in 1943. This is the story of a woman's devotion to a child who is both her burden and her blessing.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #79784 in Books
• Published on: 1999-04-28
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 368 pages

Customer Reviews

Realistic portrayal of parents struggling with retardation
Jewel is a woman who earns our respect for the sacrifices she is willing to make to ensure that her Brenda Kay has the best opportunity to aquire skills and knowledge despite her retardation. Less admirable, but a sympatheic character nonetheless, is Leston, whose pride is injured by his failure to be financialy successful, and by losing what he perceives to be his head-of-the-household status. Lott has written a compelling novel that disappointingly loses steam in its final chapters when decisions must be made for the future.

A JEWEL OF A NOVEL...
This is a wonderful, luminous book about families. It focuses on one family, in particular. The novel centers around a poor, undereducated woman named Jewel, who began her life in the backwoods of rural Mississippi. It takes us on her life journey and, consequently, that of family. It shows us how Jewel dealt with a situation that can often make or break a family, and the impact that this issue had on that same family.

Beautifully written in the voice of a poor, ill educated, southern woman, the author gives life to a three dimensional character, Jewel. Born in 1904, her parents died when she was young. She then lived with her maternal grandmother who simply did not treat her with affection, as she had disapproved of her daughter's marriage to Jewel's father. While Jewel's grandmother did her duty by her, Jewel lived a life devoid of familial love and affection.

Consequently, when Jewel up and married, she was determined to have a household filled with love. She and her devoted husband, Leston, made a life. They had five children. Life was good, though hard. Then they had a sixth child, Brenda Kay, when Jewel was pushing forty. They loved her dearly. It soon, however, became apparent that Brenda Kay was not like their other children. Jewel's worst fears were realized, when she was told that her youngest daughter had Down Syndrome.

How Jewel coped and how this event affected each member of the family is the crux of this wonderfully written novel. Brenda Kay's birth is the catalyst for a journey that would take this family in search of a better life for its newest member. It would be a test of the measure of the love that they had for one another. It is a story of perseverance and survival. It is a story of familial love and acceptance. It is a story of a mother's struggle to make sure that her beloved child reaches her full potential, no matter what the cost.