Tia lives with her mom in a high-risk neighborhood in New Orleans and loves singing gospel in the Rainbow Choir with Keisha, her boisterous and assertive best friend. Tia's dream is to change the world with her voice; and by all accounts, she might be talented enough. But when a shooting happens in her neighborhood and she learns the truth about the crime that sent her father to prison years ago, Tia finds she can't sing anymore. The loss prompts her to start asking the people in her community hard questions--questions everyone has always been too afraid to ask.
★★★1/2
Tia is at her local church practicing with the children's Rainbow Choir when the sound of gunfire rings through the air. All the children are immediately hustled down to the church's basement, where they are instructed to stay until police arrive and investigate. Once the go-ahead is given to bring everyone back upstairs, the kids learn that someone was taken to the hospital, but no other information is provided. Shortly after the news, Tia suffers a fainting spell and cuts the back of her head. The sequence of events from this one traumatic afternoon lead the reader into learning the specific difficulties within Tia's childhood.
Life has been rocky for twelve year old Tia Rose for awhile now. Her father is serving a life sentence in prison for armed robbery; Tia's mother juggles 2-3 jobs to keep the bills paid, so about the only time Tia gets to spend time with her mom is when mom comes home to sleep between shifts; Tia's home sits in a somewhat sketchy, less safe area of New Orleans.... and Tia's mom constantly worries for her daughter's safety, due to dad's criminal background and Tia being the white girl in a predominately black neighborhood.
Anyone else singing Everclear at this point? No? Just me?
Speaking of dad's criminal record, it turns out there is more to the story of the crime than Tia's been told. Because Tia's mother has tried to keep her safe and sheltered from the world's judgement and refuses to talk about the night of the crime that changed her life forever, Tia is forced to hear the real truth from best friend Keisha. Truthfully, it seems like, in fact, Tia is the very last to know the real story. Once our main girl is made aware, she notices most of the town giving her serious side-eye, just waiting for her to turn criminal like her daddy.
If Keisha had asked, I couldn't have said where I was going, but somewhere deep inside, I'd already made up my mind. I was drawn by a powerful force, like the Mississippi River flowing relentlessly into the sea.
I couldn't quite put my finger on what exactly, but something about Going's writing style reminded me somewhat of the works of David Almond. Not necessarily the mystical, magical elements he tends to incorporate --- though there's maybe a little of that within Going's "Raven Woman" character here --- but more in the overall tone and flow of the prose itself. Pieces of Why is a good story in the way it illustrates how the families of the criminal, as well as those of the victims, can suffer. There's also a moving message behind the way Tia's mother so thoroughly sacrifices any personal happiness or interests for the sake of keeping her daughter safe. It's a powerful reminder to think on family relationships and the complications and conflicts therein... what one might see as cold disinterest might actually be someone barely holding themselves together by the thinnest fragment of sanity and inner strength.
I don't know how many MG / YA readers will catch Jerome's Jim Croce reference there towards the end, but I appreciated it. :-)
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