The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store: A Novel

This novel is set in Pottstown, PA, a grimy eastern Pennsylvania factory town, not far from where I grew up. The characters (in the 70's) are the town's black residents and Jewish immigrants living on "Chicken Hill" which is the "wrong side of the tracks." The town's chief doctor marches feebly disguised as the Grand Wizard of the Klan (and as you know they aren't any fonder of Jews than black folks) and people are going through that struggle to create a business and make a go of life in the United States, away from the horrors of Europe or the Jim Crow South--and creating their own heaven-or hell on Earth. The book has an almost fairytale or fantasy quality to the story telling, the characters are roughly drawn with larger-than-life attributes; an ability to tell the future, a hunchback or lame leg, a boy deafened by a domestic accident. The quality of the storytelling is also rather timeless--it could have been set in the 19th century, as well as the mid 20th. I started reading and couldn't put it down for a minute--grabs you page one. So if you love any other of McBride's books or the stories of Alice Walker or Toni Morrison or E. Annie Proulx, you'll love this too.

This book is about faith in all forms, and how sometimes we let our trust in God, either as an excuse or as a balm, keep us from taking agency in our own lives. There's an interesting divide between characters who put their faith in prayer and an overarching plan and God's timing, and those who have different beliefs, maybe sharing space with more traditional religion in their souls, who are spurred to act when needs must. The titular grocery store in the book is run by Chona, who lives her convictions, calling out injustice and extending credit and charity to the community around her in the once-mixed but mostly Black area where she lives. The good she puts out in the world touches every other character in the book, and when she dies, every other character is spurred in some way to action. She and her husband are hiding an orphan boy who the state wants to institutionalize in their store, he is discovered under terrible circumstances, and stories converge around it. This is one of those books where the author skillfully plants tiny seeds throughout and they grow and tangle together until all the disparate plots and threads comes together in the end. The writing is lovely, with talk of the town's founder's "portrait looming in every town building, the old man's face peering over every citizen's shoulder like a ghost taking attendance" and "slices of his memory fluttered back like pages in a book." The book takes place for the most part in the 1930s, except for a couple instances of flash forward references to the (our present) future, with "they didn't realize it but one day there would be cell phones or school shootings" asides. I just didn't see how we needed it. This book is about the cancer of white supremacist thought and the mistreatment of immigrants, the injustice of the carceral state especially how it affects Black people, and the shocking small mindedness and protective husbanding of who gets to live the American Dream in the 1930s. I think I can follow the breadcrumbs to present day fairly easily without anyone pointing the way. The author is undeniably good, and the story was important and interesting. The mixing of Black and Jewish immigrant neighborhoods, and how that stands in contrast with the "older" white parts of town is an area of American history I hadn't spent a lot of time in. But it's a rough read, particularly when we see the playbook that motivates the worst characters here being used in society today. I do, however, wish I had the gravitas to pull off "Come set down here and feel some of the Lord's quiet." when people are talking too much. CW for two attempted/initiated SA on page, and description of CSA off page in past.

“Moshe had few friends. Most of Pottstown’s Jews had left Chicken Hill by then. Nate was a friend, but he was a Negro, so there was that space between them.” (p62) This is a brilliantly written, extraordinary story: at once sad and hopeful, tragic and humorous. It absolutely lives up to all the accolades. Despite “the skeleton in the well” mentioned in the first line of the book, this isn’t a conventional who-done-it. Yes, the mystery of the skeleton hovers quietly over the story, but it’s largely in the background in a narrative about the difficult lives of a diverse group of small-town, lower-class folks trying to get by. Prejudice and discrimination mix with accommodation and friendship, suspicions and mistrust bump up against shared experience and the best of humanity. And the dialog – oh the dialog! “So he balled up his fist…and I mean that white boy reached back and sent that big fist of his rambling through four or five states before it said hello to Fatty. It started in Mississippi, gone up through the Carolinas, stopped for coffee in Virginia, picked up steam coming outta Maryland…and boom! He liked to part Fatty from this world.” Or this: “Bernice had the kind of face that would make a man wire home for money.” And this: “…it’s not technically illegal. But we gotta do it at night.” Ultimately this book is an invitation to appreciate the value of empathy and respect. It’s a powerful reminder that we’re all in this together. And yes – it’s a delight to read.

Didn’t enjoy the book at all . The story was a good one , but the unravelling of the plot was uninteresting, and language difficult to follow Disappointing book

James McBride has a gift of embracing the reader with both arms and guiding them through each page with honesty and humor. His characters are painted with layers of complexity and compassion. This book left me with hope and endearment for humanity.

Heel goed geschreven. Heelnmooi maar ook droevig verhaal. Mooie karakterschetsen.

A beautiful moving story, couldn’t put it down ! I loved each character & didn’t want it ever to finish!!

Ein hervorragendes Buch!