Leaving Gee’s Bend

Irene Latham. New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 2010.  240 pp. (Hardback).

Although she lived just more than a hundred miles from Gee’s Bend, Ala., Irene Latham had never been there and had certainly never viewed the famous quilts produced by the residents of the tiny town. She loved textiles, however, and decided to attend an exhibit of Gee’s Bend quilts in New York. Fascinated, she could not get the quilts and stories of Gee’s Bend out of her mind; “Leaving Gee’s Bend” is the result.

The story is told through the voice of Ludelphia Bennett, a black child growing up during the Great Depression. It was a difficult time for most Alabamians, but even more difficult for sharecroppers who lived from one crop to the next, with little buffer between them and disaster. Ludelphia weaves the story through and around a quilt she is making for her ailing mother. The framework for the story is based on a true incident, while the characters are fictional.