May 3, 2021
Weiss (If the Creek Don’t Rise) delivers an intriguing coming of age story of two 13-year-old girls whose summer idyll is complicated by mysterious events. Lucy Brown lives on a tobacco farm in Riverton, N.C., in 1943 with her six siblings. She forms a quick friendship with Bert Tucker, who comes to Riverton to stay with her pregnant aunt Violet, whose husband Larry has disappeared, after Bert’s mother dies. Lucy’s mother then brings Bert into the Browns’ home when Violet is admitted to a psychiatric hospital. Lucy’s understanding of WWII is based on her knowledge of her older soldier brother, Everett, and of her father’s deal with the U.S. government to provide beeswax. But after Riverton becomes home to a Nazi prisoner-of-war camp, Lucy learns firsthand of the war’s divisiveness, as rumors and distrust run rampant through the community. Lucy, an avid Nancy Drew reader, then bands with Bert in an effort solve the mystery of Larry’s disappearance, and of a singer who went missing after performing at a town dance. Weiss expertly highlights how Lucy and Bert’s innocence is altered by their experiences, with spot-on depictions of the rural Southern community. This is magnetic from the start. Agent: Rebecca Gradinger, Fletcher and Co.
