The Improper Life of Bezellia Grove
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Book Overview
A privileged Southern girl must choose between her heart and her family's expectations in this heartfelt novel from the author of The Funeral Dress.
"Simply a wonderful book . . . bold and tender and memorable."--Terry Kay, author of To Dance with the White Dog and The Book of Marie It's hard to be your own person, especially if your name is Bezellia Grove. Relationships are complicated in 1960s Nashville, where society is neatly ordered by class, status, and skin color. For the Groves, one of the city's most prominent families, and particularly Bezellia, uniquely named for a fiery ancestor, it's especially difficult. Bezellia is closer to the family's black servants, her nanny, Maizelle, and the handyman, Nathaniel, than she is to her alcoholic mother and her distant, inaccessible father. When Bezellia has a clandestine affair with Nathaniel's son Samuel, their romance is met with anger and fear from both families. In a time and place where rebelling against the rules carries a steep price, Bezellia Grove must decide which of her names will be the one that defines her.
"Simply a wonderful book . . . bold and tender and memorable."--Terry Kay, author of To Dance with the White Dog and The Book of Marie It's hard to be your own person, especially if your name is Bezellia Grove. Relationships are complicated in 1960s Nashville, where society is neatly ordered by class, status, and skin color. For the Groves, one of the city's most prominent families, and particularly Bezellia, uniquely named for a fiery ancestor, it's especially difficult. Bezellia is closer to the family's black servants, her nanny, Maizelle, and the handyman, Nathaniel, than she is to her alcoholic mother and her distant, inaccessible father. When Bezellia has a clandestine affair with Nathaniel's son Samuel, their romance is met with anger and fear from both families. In a time and place where rebelling against the rules carries a steep price, Bezellia Grove must decide which of her names will be the one that defines her.
Format:Paperback
Language:English
ISBN:0307395049
ISBN13:9780307395047
Release Date:August 2011
Publisher:Crown Publishing Group (NY)
Length:272 Pages
Weight:0.51 lbs.
Dimensions:0.6" x 5.3" x 8.0"
Customer Reviews
2 ratings
3 stars
Published by INKwitchery , 8 months ago
THE IMPROPER LIFE OF BEZELLIA GROVE by Susan Gregg Gilmore
A charming coming of age story set in the 1960s. Bezellia Grove grows up within an affluent family in Nashville Tennessee. While her physician father is busy at work and her emotionally abusive, alcoholic mother cares more about her social life, Bezellia and her sister Adelaide have come to rely on their nanny Maizelle and handyman Nathaniel for familial love and support.
Once Bezellia develops feelings for Nathaniel’s son Samuel, she begins to see the glaring differences between class, status and skin color within the uppity society and community in they live in.
This is one of those stories that has been repeated time and time again; forbidden love, a clash of two cultures etc. While it’s a good story with an interesting premise and characters, there just wasn’t anything special or specific enough to make it stand out from other books in this genre.
Rating: 3/5 ⭐️
We All Need To Feel Loved
Published by Judi Burns , 6 years ago
Bezellia Grove grows up in an affluent and dysfunctional home in Tennessee. Her mother is an alcoholic. Her father is a Physician who is never home. The housemaid and handyman are who she feels more a kin to besides her sister, who has her own emotional issues. She just wants to be loved and finds it in a time that the world is not ready for it.
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