I enjoyed this read more than I didn’t. The stories in the beginning definitely sat me down and had me afraid. I didn’t have any time for any breakdowns or breakthroughs so I put it down for a few days, and that helped 😩😂.

I loved and loved how southern each story is and each story definitely kept me reading. I found them all to be very meaty. Like good foreplay. And then I’d get to the end and it would be like… “That’s it?”

I wanted more concrete closure for them. It sounds so childish and petty but I did 😭. I felt like some of the endings were ambiguous, quick, and poetic. Kind of ending with a question mark, which sucks because I know I’ll probably never see these characters again since it’s a book of short stories and all.

Overall I’m happy I read it and I’m also happy to move on to other reads.

While terrible things happen in a couple of these stories, in most of them the horrific events occur just out of frame. These are stories about the times after the worst things, or before, or besides. There’s a comfort and perhaps a resolution of tension in this. Sometimes home is the place with teeth, sometimes home is a refuge. Sometimes there are monsters under the bed, and sometimes they stay there and you learn to live with or befriend them. Terrible things do happen, in stories and in life. Here are depictions of what else happens, what goes and continues on.

“This strange, strange moment, which you’ve only just now understood. You, another sort of dangerous thing, in how easy you were to love. You could spook anyone with how close you were willing to get, with how you opened yourself up to the world and opened others too. Now, the hardest thing is getting back. She is waiting, the girl of you, shouting from a distance for your return.”

The writing is beautiful and evocative. This won’t be my favorite short story collection of the year (that superlative will likely go to Amal El-Mohtar’s Seasons of Glass & Iron), but I know the stories will stay with me. They’ll live in my bones, and I’ll think back on them in hazy recollection as if they were my own memories and not a book I read.

I’m so happy I read this.

Ms. Tina’s life was and is so full and I love how country she is. She loves her siblings and her parents and has so many wonderful memories and lessons she’s learned. I’m happy she shared them with us.

Her childhood (minus the time spent in Catholic School and some other things I won’t spoil) was probably the most fun I’ve had in reading a memoir, even though her family was really poor—they made a way.

I also enjoyed learning she was never hit by her parents as a kid. Which can be so unheard of in Black households, and she’s old! It was nice having a real life example of an older Black woman growing up in a Black family who didn’t hit because you’d think us millennials pulled our unwillingness to hit our kids out of our asses.

It was also fun/moving/ hearing context behind all the looks in the Destiny Child days and her love life. What I was most surprised by was how similar Beyoncé and Solange are to their mama. It really gave me more insight into how children really watch us (especially mothers when and if they can).

I think Ms. Tina’s heart is really big and she loves her children and loves being a mother, and has finally forgiven her mother, and it was really well done. Solid 4 stars.