The master of the short form is back with her first book in eleven years: and it’s a novel! Most known for Birds of America, her spectacular collection of stories, Moore takes on bigger topics in her new book: mainly racism, terrorism, war and liberal politics.
Tassie Keltjin is a farm girl transplanted to a college campus in the midwest. It’s just after 9/11 and Tassie is being opened up to sophisticated ideas and the works of Chaucer and Sylvia Plath. She was raised by a potato culitvator who is an outcast and not quite accepted by the farming community.
Badly in need of a job, Tassie becomes a nanny to a sophisticated couple. Sarah is a chef at a french restuarant and her husband is a cancer researcher. They adopt a mixed race child and name her Mary Emma. They soon start a group for parents of mixed race children after they face bigotry. Meanwhile Tassie’s brother is questioning whether or not to join the army.
But nothing is as it seems as Tassie learns shocking things about her handsome, brazillian boyfriend and her employers.
The writing is graceful and elegant, the plot intriguing and the book a complete success. It may have take eleven years but it was well worth the wait!
