The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store

"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."-- Provided by publisher.

REVIEWS & SUMMARIES

COMMUNITY REVIEWS

Spoiler alert* submitted by glazewsk on April 21, 2024, 3:43pm After waiting so long for this book, I was deeply disappointed. It took half the book (~180 pgs) to got even somewhat “hooked”. And where was this author’s editor? So much superfluous writing not related in any way to the main story threads, like the Malachi chapters. I could have used more info about Chona’s mysterious illness, although I realize that little was probably known about it in 1936. I feel as if I haven’t read such a pointless book since Cloud Cuckoo Land.

Unique and Interesting story submitted by kath on June 16, 2024, 9:38pm I really enjoyed the mix of cultures in this story. The author seems to be very familiar with all the communities represented. I recommend this as well as other books by this author.

Meh submitted by amym on June 29, 2024, 3:54pm This book never really grabbed me. There were so many characters, some who had very little to do with the story, and I couldn't keep them all straight. Some characters just disappeared. The first half of the book was all over the place, without much of a story. Maybe it was a way to introduce all the characters, but many of them were really never fleshed out. I waited for almost half a year to get this book on Libby, and I was disappointed.

So many characters submitted by khrobinson on July 7, 2024, 7:31am This book is full of characters, from people to neighborhoods to communities. Who is the main character? Many of them. To tell the story of a place, a person, there are many roles and stories that weave together. This book does a beautiful job of weaving a legacy, centering Black and Jewish communities and highlighting the shallowness and lies upon which whiteness rests.

Just OK submitted by purchasingqueen on July 7, 2024, 1:55pm I had such high hopes and had anticipated reading this book for so long. Maybe that was part of why I felt so let down. It wasn't until more than halfway through that I was even mildly interested in most of the characters. There were so many superfluous characters that I didn't think added to the story and were hard to remember, if you put the book down, which I did repeatedly, trying again, multiple times, to get it to keep my interest. The pace was extremely slow. The characters I wanted to know more about didn't get featured in detail and those I didn't really care about did. Overall, I would rate this book a 'meh'/C/C+. Perhaps the audio book would be better?

hard to put down in the second half submitted by gw on July 12, 2024, 1:17am This took a while to get going, but I'm glad I stuck with it because the story and characters are so worth it.