Straight masterfully blends the story of her Inland Empire hometown with the stories of the women — tough, trauma-burdened women — who (somehow) make their way west
Certain books give off the sense that you won’t want them to end, so splendid the writing, so lyrical the stories. Such is the case with Southern California novelist Susan Straight’s new memoir, “In the Countr y of Women.”
Writing a love letter to her three grown daughters, Straight tells stories of her own childhood with her siblings and frugal, Dodger-loving, Swiss immigrant mother and weaves them together with tales of her ex-husband Dwayne Sims’ more populous and effusive African American family.
There is Straight’s own paternal grandmother, Ruby, who drove a Model A Ford with five sisters from Illinois to Colorado and then fled repeatedly to Southern California; or Rosa, Straight’s maternal grandmother, “a woman from a Grimm’s fairy tale, a stern and tireless general who with no assistance kept my feckless grandfather and his children alive by leading them to Fontana, Calif.”
Even after their divorce, she and Dwayne remained connected; together they’d take their daughters to the beach and talk regularly. “We know countless ex-couples like us. Whether it’s because we can’t afford to move away after we divorce, or we’re too lazy to dislike each other efficiently and permanently, it seems to work.
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