Adie's plan doesn't find a lot of success, but life's at least bearable thanks to several key people: Murphy Spencer, her kind-hearted neighbor, whose constant aid seems motivated by something more than just neighborliness; Willa Mae Satterfield, Murphy's sassy surrogate mother; and Tempe Jordan, a slave girl, whose diary Willa Mae loans to Adie. Although the girls are separated by 100 years, Adie relates to Tempe's hard-scrabble life. Reading Tempe's words brings solace to Adie, who's struggling with an unfaithful husband, a scheming mother-in-law, a chicken herd gone wild, and the sweet, forbidden love that dances just out of reach. As if that wasn't enough, long-suppressed images seem to be taking over Adie's mind - images that suggest she was directly responsible for her sister's death. Secrets - from her family, Buck's, even Murphy's - threaten to rip her apart. When brave Adie finally demands the truth, it changes the way she sees everything - and everyone - in her life. Some secrets she learns too late, and some just in time, to save herself and the people she loves. "Secrets," she says

This is a story about the unraveling, and the almost irreperable destruction caused by secrecy and lies.

From the first line of Cold Rock River ("I was five that Spring Annie choked on a jelly bean" [11]) the reader gets sucked into Adie's tale of life in rural Georgia during the tumultuous '60s. She narrates with humor and a naivete that will endure her to all readers. Tempe's voice is just as compelling, perhaps even more so as she describes her "Massah" selling her children, children he sired himself, away to a slave trader. The women's voices speak in perfect harmony as they talk of sorrow, injustice and the dangerous secrets every family hides. Despite these things, their stories radiate strength, hope and healing. Suffused with Southern softness and humor, this is a beautiful story about truth, lies and the ever-conquering power of the human spirit. I couldn't put it down.

Grade: B+