Copyright © 2009, Melissa Newman
Published by Whiskey Creek Press LLC

Reviews For SISTER BLACKBERRY by Melissa Newman

“As Newman’s three generations of women struggle to cope with domestic violence, alcoholism, and guilt they too jump from the page as fully realized human beings. All are multi-dimensional characters and quite capable of repeatedly making bad or stupid decisions as they struggle to make sense of their lives. Newman seems to be saying that while life is admittedly easier for 21st Century women, we lost our grandmothers’ ability to cope with and to accept the unacceptable as our expectations rose and our feelings of entitlement grew stronger. As cliché as it may sound, Newman is an up and coming fiction writer whose name we should remember to Google from time to time just to see what she’s up to. Sister Blackberry is a good read, with just enough mystery, and a rich portrait of American life in the 1930s and 40s. Newman has demonstrated substantial gifts for characterization, dialogue, and description … again, I have to say stellar first novel.”
~ Pulitzer Prize nominated author Mary Stanton

Rayes County, 1936

For the first time it was clear to her that some souls are a shade blacker than others— if this even was a soul, she didn’t recognize it. This woman, this act, was void of any color and black was absolutely a color. She couldn’t name it—the act, the soul, or lack of a soul. And the color of it or the shade of it was nothing. The moment seemed to slow time to a pace that even the night owls and other creatures took hold of: that sound of mourning coming from every direction played low and long, a sound she wouldn’t soon forget; a sound she would have joined in if only she wasn’t so afraid. She was already weak from the loss of blood and the thoughts of watching something so soft and tender have its last breath sucked out by ignorance made even the skin on her body ache with sadness.

There was a time when Viola was sure she knew the face of evil: it was dark, dirty, and ugly. Behind blackened eyes surrounded by grey pouches of sagging skin was a twisted mind bent on punishing innocence and celebrating suffering: laughing, cackling and bellowing in glee. But this face, this face was void. Although the eyes had what appeared to be hot tears in them, the moisture only magnified the emptiness that was inside.

The old woman stood there holding the knife in both hands, ready to run through it like a slab of firm butter at a feast. But there was some invisible force holding her arms back: there had to be or else she would have already pierced the helpless thing. Viola could see that’s what she meant to do, but she somehow just couldn’t manage it yet.

There was no sleep for Viola this night, just screaming, screeching voices in her mind, imprinted there from the night before. Just as she would start to lean her head and nod off to sleep, the sounds brought her back to attention. Time was different now. Slower.
Everything had become dim, like looking through dust on the other side of a window—it couldn’t be wiped from her view. If only yesterday hadn’t disappeared into the fog. Yesterday there was hope; yesterday there was Janie. Where was Janie now? She had feared the worst all night. The fear was about to take a permanent seat in Viola’s mind; it had screamed its last breath and flailed its charcoal arms at her long enough. Courage had to take a stand now, somehow, some way—if not for Viola then for the baby she now held in her arms.

She had to steal some comfort from yesterday. She knew it was there somewhere in her; she only had to close her eyes and wish it hard enough and want it to be so again.

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