THE COLOR OF LOVE: A Mother's Choice in the Jim Crow South

Cheek spins a mesmerizing yarn, told from a little boy's viewpoint, of growing up poor and white in 1950s North Carolina, surrounded by generations of wife-beating alcoholics. Through plain yet descriptive language seasoned with wry, biting adjectives, he ably conveys the sights, sounds and feelings of his surroundings. His musings are funny and hopeful, and Cheek shapes his childhood voice to suit stories of his tense relationship with his violent, alcoholic father; his mother's endless tolerance and denial; and his admiration for his maternal grandmother, who taught him to "be full of love, not hate." His child's-eye reportage captures the intricacies of his mother's postmarital relationship with Tuck, a strong, kind and gentle black man Cheek had met years earlier, and their secret life as an interracial family. The secret was revealed only after Cheek's mother had Tuck's baby, which enraged her family enough for them to have a court declare her an unfit mother. When the judge ordered her to give up one of the children, the author took the choice out of his mother's hands when he elected to leave the family and become a ward of the state, turning the formerly optimistic young man against the rest of his family. In an epilogue written in his adult voice, Cheek explains that his motivation for writing the book was vengeance, which in the process of writing turned to understanding and, finally, forgiveness. (May)