The Canary

by Jacqueline T. Moore

Amazon Best Seller
9/17/15
#83 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Literature & Fiction > African American > Historical


RECIPE FOR 1 spunky widow, 1 hateful church lady, 2 sailors & 1 checkerboard, 5 little darlin’s + I smarty stinker, Add 1 apron pocket full of jewels, Mix well and bake in the 1890’s Galveston heat. Myra Gallaway, a young widow with five children, supports her family by walking the wharves of Galveston selling homemade sweets. She never imagined she’d be joining forces with husband-hating church society queen, Julia Jameson. Myra’s apron pockets are soon filling up with the unspendables man smuggling sailor friends Sure Foot and Black Jack need to move. The Klondike gold fields are calling hapless dreamers and the boys are all about obliging them, yet everybody knows that a sailor cannot spend what he does not earn. My goodness, those unspendables are one serious problem!

212 pages, Kindle Edition

First published September 8, 2014

Reviews

[julie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Delightful first offering from an author who puts her readers smack-dab in the middle of things as the characters maneuver the social labyrinth of church ladies, younguns, race, jewelry, sailors, and "polite society" in 1890's Galveston, TX.

[Judy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Myra Galloway is young and widowed with five young children to support. She sells homemade sweets on the streets and docks of Galveston as a means to feed her family. Julia Jameson is a church going woman who discovers on her wedding night that her husband is not the man she thought he was. But is Julia really the person she appears to be? Sure Foot and Black Jack are two young boys who end up as shipmates on the Sallie Lou, an unlikely pairing but they become fast friends.
Jacqueline T. Moore's historical novel, The Canary, is set in 1890's Galveston where the summers are hot and people have secrets in their past. The characters are very believable as their lives come together and a hurricane is brewing. As a bonus recipes for the sweets are in the back of the book. This is the first of a triology and I eagerly look forward to reading more about these characters.

[Martha Moody · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jacqueline T. Moore is a storyteller who can really write. Her novel The Canary reminds me of a one of those knotty plant tubers. The central tuber—how widow Myra is able to survive with her five young children in 1890’s Galveston—is thick and strong and also knobby with side tales about sea roustabouts, boys raising chickens, racial and religious prejudice, even old-time toilet training. Appealing characters, humor, and historical detail, not to mention jolts of cheerful heartlessness, make this novel an exuberant read.
--Martha Moody, author of Best Friends

[T.A. Bound · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really loved this book!

Beautifully crafted, the character and story development is enchanting. A very uplifting story that touches deep emotional chords while, at the same time, being lighthearted and fun.

[Jeanne Estridge · Rating 4 out of 5]

I got really caught up in the story of Myra and Julia and the other Galvestonians in the months before the 1900 hurricane. Myra was a resourceful heroine and her struggles to support herself and her five young children after their father dies were very engaging. Julia had this really great character arc (my favorite part of any story). The best part, though, may have been all the great historical detail. I came away feeling like I'd just spent a few months living on that little island off the coast of Texas.