Miss Hazel and the Rosa Parks League - Hardcover

A terrific novel that will take its place in the distinguished pantheon of Southern fiction PAT CONROY, author of The Prince of Tides and South of Broad "Here it comes---barreling down the track like a runaway train, a no-holds-barred Southern novel as tragic and complicated as the Jim Crow era it depicts. Author Odell is taking it all on: issues of class as well as race--- hope, love and idealism along with evil, greed, downright meanness and cruelty. You will fall in love with both main characters: Vida, the young unwed black mother living with her revered minister father, Levi, and her mixed-race child; and innocent Hazel, unable to escape her white trash upbringing, who finds more community with Vida and the other maids than with the upper class white women in the Delta town of Delphi, Mississippi. Odell escapes stereotype by diving deep into all his characters way down below the apparent surface of, say, corrupt white sheriff Billy Dean Brister; or the all-powerful old white Senator in his mansion The Columns just outside town; or the town whore, Sweet Pea; or the ambitious up-and-coming car salesman, Floyd Graham, determined to rise above his raising and drag his wife Hazel along, too. These characters are as deeply complex as the times, the plot as winding as those roads that Miss Hazel keep driving and driving in her big car. MISS HAZEL AND THE ROSA PARKS LEAGUE is a big brilliant novel whose time has come." --Lee Smith, New York Times bestselling author of The Last Girls and Guest on Earth "In Miss Hazel and the Rosa Parks League, Jonathan Odell uses an unlikely friendship between two women--one white and one black--to explore the roots of the civil rights movement in the South. With its deftly drawn characters, delicious dialog, and deeply satisfying and hopeful ending, this fine novel deserves to win the hearts of readers everywhere." --Meg Waite Clayton, New York Times bestselling author of The Wednesday Sisters"

"Jonathan Odell can take his place in the distinguished pantheon of Southern authors" -- Pat Conroy, author of The Prince of Tides, The Death of Santini Here it comes---barreling down the track like a runaway train, a no-holds-barred Southern novel as tragic and complicated as the Jim Crow era it depicts. Author Jonathan Odell is taking it all on: issues of class as well as race--- hope, love and idealism along with evil, greed, downright meanness and cruelty. You will fall in love with both women: Vida, the young unwed black mother living with her revered minister father, Levi, and her mixed-race child; and innocent Hazel, unable to escape her white trash upbringing, who finds more community with Vida and the other maids than with the upper class white women in the Delta town of Delphi, Mississippi. His characters are as deeply complex as the times, the plot as winding as those roads that Miss Hazel keeps driving and driving in her big car. Miss Hazel and the Rosa Parks League is a big brilliant novel whose time has come. -- Lee Smith, New York Times Bestselling author of The Last Girls and Guests on Earth In Miss Hazel and the Rosa Parks League, Jonathan Odell uses a singular friendship between two women--one white and one black--to explore the roots of the civil rights movement in the South. With its deftly drawn characters, delicious dialog, and deeply satisfying and hopeful ending, this fine novel deserves to win the hearts of readers everywhere. Book clubs, this one is definitely for you! -- Meg Waite Clayton, author of The Wednesday Sisters"

"A terrific novel that will take its place in the distinguished pantheon of Southern fiction." --PAT CONROY, author of The Prince of Tides and South of Broad "Here it comes---barreling down the track like a runaway train, a no-holds-barred Southern novel as tragic and complicated as the Jim Crow era it depicts. Author Odell is taking it all on: issues of class as well as race--- hope, love and idealism along with evil, greed, downright meanness and cruelty. You will fall in love with both main characters: Vida, the young unwed black mother living with her revered minister father, Levi, and her mixed-race child; and innocent Hazel, unable to escape her white trash upbringing, who finds more community with Vida and the other maids than with the upper class white women in the Delta town of Delphi, Mississippi. Odell escapes stereotype by diving deep into all his characters way down below the apparent surface of, say, corrupt white sheriff Billy Dean Brister; or the all-powerful old white Senator in his mansion The Columns just outside town; or the town whore, Sweet Pea; or the ambitious up-and-coming car salesman, Floyd Graham, determined to rise above his raising and drag his wife Hazel along, too. These characters are as deeply complex as the times, the plot as winding as those roads that Miss Hazel keep driving and driving in her big car. MISS HAZEL AND THE ROSA PARKS LEAGUE is a big brilliant novel whose time has come." --Lee Smith, New York Times bestselling author of The Last Girls and Guest on Earth "In Miss Hazel and the Rosa Parks League, Jonathan Odell uses an unlikely friendship between two women--one white and one black--to explore the roots of the civil rights movement in the South. With its deftly drawn characters, delicious dialog, and deeply satisfying and hopeful ending, this fine novel deserves to win the hearts of readers everywhere. Book clubs, this one is definitely for you!"--Meg Waite Clayton, New York Times bestselling author of The Wednesday Sisters "This novel, told through the eyes of two different but utterly memorable women-one white and one black-vividly brings to life a fabulous cast of characters as well as a troubling time in our not-so-distant past. Odell is an astonishingly good storyteller. You won t want to miss this one." --CASSANDRA KING, author of The Sunday Wife and Moonrise "Soaring high above the trite aphorisms of Southern "chick" literature, Odell incorporates the essences of other literary offerings in the same genre, putting his second novel alongside such notables as The Help, Gone with the Wind, To Kill a Mockingbird, Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistlestop Cafe, and Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood. Not to mention the works of Eudora Welty, the pioneer of Southern fiction." --Author Exposure "

Set in pre-Civil Rights Mississippi, Miss Hazel and the Rosa Parks League is the story of two young mothers, Hazel and Vida – one wealthy and white and the other poor and black – who have only two things in common: the devastating loss of their children, and a deep and abiding loathing for one another. Embittered and distrusting, Vida is harassed by Delphi’s racist sheriff and haunted by the son she lost to the world. Hazel, too, has lost a son and can’t keep a grip on her fractured life. After drunkenly crashing her car into a manger scene while gunning for the baby Jesus, Hazel is sedated and bed-ridden. Hazel’s husband hires Vida to keep tabs on his unpredictable wife and to care for his sole surviving son. Forced to spend time together with no one else to rely on, the two women find they have more in common than they thought, and together they turn the town on its head. It is the story of a town, a people, and a culture on the verge of a great change that begins with small things, like unexpected friendship.