A Good Neighborhood
Author: Therese Anne Fowler
Publisher: St. Martin's Publishing Group
Date of Publication: March 10, 2020
Pages: 320
This is a novel for our times. It is set in a bucolic racially integrated neighborhood in a classic Southern city (the author lives in Raleigh, North Carolina). When intolerable nouveau-riche white people invade with their gentrification and scorched earth attitude towards the environment, conflict arises. The characters are a bit stereotypical, but that sets the stage for the struggles which ensue. The basic conflict involves a stately oak tree which is irreparably damaged when a huge home is built next door. Racial, class, religious, age discriminations, and unfounded fear add dimension to and accelerate the tensions between neighbors.
About half way through this book, I couldn't decide whose story it was. Was it the story of Valerie Alston-Holt, a college professor who happens to also be a black single mother with a talented, mixed-race teenaged son? (She also owns the home with the oak tree.) Was it the story of Xavier, her gifted musician-son who has earned a prestigious college scholarship? Was it the story of Brad Whitman, the narcissistic good old boy who tears down an older home and builds the McMansion next to Valerie, in the process destroying her pastoral back yard? Was it the story of Juniper, Brad's step-daughter who is drawn to her new neighbor, Xavier, like a moth to a flame despite the Purity Promise she has made at her evangelical church? After reaching the book's heartbreaking conclusion, I realized that this is OUR story: America's story. It's the story of what happens when events transpire based on false assumptions, age-old stereotypes, and ingrained prejudices. It reminds me a bit of Celeste Ng's Little Fires Everywhere, in that the underlying theme is race, but so much more is layered into the story. Hypocrisy abounds, self-centered agendas rule, and the common good gets thrown under a bus.
The author uses an interesting technique: she introduces some chapters with unnamed omniscient third person narrators. This Greek chorus of un-named neighbors are witnessing events unfold while trying not to be involved. Some narrations are told with a retrospective feel, hinting at the story's eventual outcome. The interesting effect which this technique has is that it makes the reader feel a part of the neighborhood. It makes you think "What would I be thinking or doing if this was going on down my street?"
A Good Neighborhood is an excellent book. It has a terrible sense of dread which propels you through the chapters. The writing is crisp and economical - no wasted words. The story really is a parable for our times. There is much here to make the reader stop and ponder. It makes you look at your own "good neighborhood" in a different light. It is one of those books which entertains but at the same time teaches. It is remarkable.
