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Summary
Summary
From the author of the bestselling The Supremes at Earl's All-You-Can-Eat , The Supremes Sing the Happy Heartache Blues, an exuberant and poignant new audiobook of passions, family, and forgiveness
When a late life love affair blooms between Mr. Forrest Payne, the owner of the Pink Slipper Gentleman's Club, and Miss Beatrice Jordan, famous for stationing herself at the edge of the club's parking lot and yelling warnings of eternal damnation at the departing patrons, their wedding summons a legend to town. Mr. El Walker, the great guitar bluesman, comes home to give a command performance in Plainview, Indiana, a place he'd sworn--and for good reason--he'd never set foot in again.
But El is not the only Plainview native with a hurdle to overcome. A wildly philandering husband struggles at last to prove his faithfulness to the wife he's always loved. And among those in this tightly knit community who show up every Sunday after church for lunch at Earl's All-You-Can-Eat, are the lifelong friends, known locally as "The Supremes" --Clarice, facing down her longing for, chance at and fear of a great career; Barbara Jean, grappling at last with the loss of a mother whose life humiliated both of them, and Odette, reaching toward her husband through an anger of his that she does not understand.
Edward Kelsey Moore's lively cast of characters, each of whom have surmounted serious trouble and come into love, need not learn how to survive but how, fully, to live. And they do, every one of them, serenaded by the bittersweet and unforgettable blues song El Walker plays, born of his own great loss and love.
Reviews (4)
Publisher's Weekly Review
Moore (The Supremes at Earl's All-You-Can-Eat) returns to Plainview, Ind., to tell further delightful tales of the Supremes, with story lines filled with music and the pain between fathers and their adult children. If these Supremes were a musical group rather than childhood friends with a nickname that has lasted decades, Odette Henry would be the lead singer. She is always trying to help those around her and has become accustomed to receiving sometimes-useful advice from her dead mother and other spirits. Odette and her friend Barbara Jean Carlson hope to orchestrate a reconciliation between blues man El Walker, long absent from town, and his son, Odette's husband, James. Other plot threads follow the third Supreme, Clarice Baker, who's struggling with nerves before her Chicago piano concert. Moore weaves these and other strands together beautifully, with humor balancing out the more painful moments. His characters, both living and dead, come together to make a wonderful whole. (June) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Kirkus Review
The three childhood friends Moore introduced in The Supremes at Earl's All-You-Can-Eat (2013) are now in their early 60s and facing new challenges.The three "Supremes" of Plainview, Indianaa name that emphasizes the unpretentious tone of Moore's storytellingare down-home African-American women, except that Clarice is a concert pianist with a penchant for Beethoven, Barbara Jean is Plainview's wealthiest philanthropist, and Odettewell, Odette talks to the dead. At the unlikely wedding of Clarice's religious-zealot mother to the owner of a dive called the Pink Slipper Gentlemen's Club that has only recently become "a respected music venue," all three friends are moved by elderly blues singer El Walker's rendition of the "Happy Heartache Blues." And thus hangs the thread that winds a plot ever so loosely through the novel. El is actually Marcus Henry and the father of Odette's husband, James. While a heroin addict, El abandoned his wife and small son after accidentally slicing James with a razor blade. El is off drugs, but diabetes lands him in the hospital, where his identity is revealed. As Odette tries to find a way for James and El to come to terms with each other, Clarice prepares for her big breakthrough concert in Chicago. Separated from her philandering husband, Richmond, she's enjoying her independence and their continuing active sex life, but she feels increasingly stifled by Richmond's needy desire for the kind of intimacy he withheld in the past. Recovering alcoholic Barbara Jean is in a happy second marriage and gets less page time than her friends. Subplots meander along concerning both serious issues like a father's cruelty to his gay, cross-dressing son and sitcom clichs like a pompous, big-hatted would-be preacher lady whose hateful pretensions are exposed by an open microphone. Religion is central to most of these lives although its form ranges from fundamentalist Baptist to Unitarian. This is comfort-food fiction, undemanding and full of Moore's sweet but not saccharine affection for his characters. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
As Moore continues the tale begun in The Supremes at Earl's All-You-Can-Eat (2013), blues-legend El Walker, who left Plainview, Indiana, ages ago, returns to sing at the unlikely wedding of the town's strip-club owner and its most straitlaced and religious matron. El had sworn never to return after his drug habit and long-buried history cost him his marriage and relationship with his son. His return triggers old secrets and ripples through the lives of the Supremes, three women whose childhood friendship has survived marital, health, and all manner of other crises. Odette continues to manage visits by the spirit of her long-departed mother, even as she helps her husband, James, cope with the return of his estranged father, El. Recovering-alcoholic Barbara Jean is confronted with memories of her long-dead mother, a childhood acquaintance of El's. Clarice copes with ardent efforts by her estranged husband to revive the marriage and her own rising musical career as a concert pianist. Moore weaves together the lives of these women and their families into a story that closely examines the impact of a father's presence or absence on children well into adulthood.--Bush, Vanessa Copyright 2017 Booklist
Library Journal Review
Readers will be pleased to catch up with the three lifelong friends, dubbed in high school "the Supremes," from the author's best-selling debut, The Supremes at Earl's All-You-Can-Eat. A cast of quirky residents of Plainview, IN, from Baptist assistant pastors to traveling bluesmen, orbits now middle-aged Odette, Clarice, and Barbara Jean in this story of family, friendship, and forgiveness. The novel opens with an unusual wedding scene involving a pair of octogenerians who once were sworn enemies. Sensitive, strong, sharp-tongued Odette narrates several chapters, providing insight on each new crisis (big or small) gleaned from living in a small town or from her dead mama, who pops up unexpectedly to chat. VERDICT Moore's bluesy, breezy novel takes readers through life's highs and lows and in-between times when no one knows what is coming next; its air of folksy optimism should appeal to fans of Alexander McCall Smith and Fredrik Backman. [See Prepub Alert, 12/19/16.]-Laurie Cavanaugh, Thayer P.L., Braintree, MA © Copyright 2017. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
