The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store
AN INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
“A murder mystery locked inside a Great American Novel . . . Charming, smart, heart-blistering, and heart-healing.” —Danez Smith, The New York Times Book Review
“We all need—we all deserve—this vibrant, love-affirming novel that bounds over any difference that claims to separate us.” —Ron Charles, The Washington Post
From James McBride, author of the bestselling Oprah’s Book Club pick Deacon King Kong and the National Book Award–winning The Good Lord Bird, a novel about small-town secrets and the people who keep them
In 1972, when workers in Pottstown, Pennsylvania, were digging the foundations for a new development, the last thing they expected to find was a skeleton at the bottom of a well. Who the skeleton was and how it got there were two of the long-held secrets kept by the residents of Chicken Hill, the dilapidated neighborhood where immigrant Jews and African Americans lived side by side and shared ambitions and sorrows. Chicken Hill was where Moshe and Chona Ludlow lived when Moshe integrated his theater and where Chona ran the Heaven & Earth Grocery Store. When the state came looking for a deaf boy to institutionalize him, it was Chona and Nate Timblin, the Black janitor at Moshe’s theater and the unofficial leader of the Black community on Chicken Hill, who worked together to keep the boy safe.
As these characters’ stories overlap and deepen, it becomes clear how much the people who live on the margins of white, Christian America struggle and what they must do to survive. When the truth is finally revealed about what happened on Chicken Hill and the part the town’s white establishment played in it, McBride shows us that even in dark times, it is love and community—heaven and earth—that sustain us.
Bringing his masterly storytelling skills and his deep faith in humanity to The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store, James McBride has written a novel as compassionate as Deacon King Kong and as inventive as The Good Lord Bird.
Reviews
The opening of this book was so engaging that I immediately read it to my husband. Wow. The Jewish and Black communities of Chicken Hill in Pottstown (in the early 20th century) are portrayed intimately and with a loving hand. Characters are luminous. Plot is excellent but secondary to themes of resiliency, tenacity and the power of love.
By Lucylww
What a beautiful book. Warm, abiding and kind. Hope amidst the darkness!
By savedbyvivaldi1
What a wonderful, twisted, thought provoking story. As soon as I got over dealing with the different dialects and languages, I found myself rooting for a happy ending for Dodo.
By jkolmen50266
Differences that divide us, bring us together.
By Chrstcat
This is an interesting read portraying an American experience about marginalized cultures and their struggles and joys but not glorified to white wash the story. The web of characters is immense but each plays its part and I was glad I finished the book. I would agree with another review that the Author inserts moments that are preachy and should have let the reader unpack his story for themselves.
By Derby🌀