Copper Crown

by Lane von Herzen

Cass Sandstrom and Allie Farrell, one white and the other Black, depend on each other for strength and friendship during racial violence in 1913 Copper Crown, Texas, and their friendship continues over the ensuing years

Genres: Historical Fiction, Fiction

48 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1991

About the author

Lane von Herzen is an award-winning literary novelist. Her two books, Copper Crown (Morrow/Penguin) and The Unfastened Heart (Dutton/Penguin) were sold at auction, being published to enthusiastic critical acclaim. The film option to The Unfastened Heart sold at auction to Columbia Pictures. Copper Crown was selected for the Discover Great New Writers series by Barnes and Noble and has been taught in Women's Studies courses at colleges and universities across the United States. Both novels were selections of the Literary Guild.

Ms. von Herzen has received literary fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the California Arts Council and Yaddo. She graduated from Dartmouth College with her B.A. in English literature, magna cum laude, and obtained her MFA in English literature from the writing program at UC Irvine.

She is currently working on her third novel.

Reviews

[Brian · Rating 5 out of 5]

Kurt Vonnegut opined that the soul of writing was achieved by penning your work to an audience of one. From the early days of his story telling his sister Alice was his audience. Muse? Perhaps; either way, Vonnegut is clear that when his sister died it changed his craft completely.

I’ve been writing reviews on Goodreads for a few years now and it is time to come clean. Before I write about my thoughts concerning Copper Crown I think it is only fair to mention that the entire time I have been on this site, my audience of one has been my daughter, Belinda. Today she is nine years-old, and I hope that one day when she is older and reading books both fiction and non that she might find her way to some of her old man’s thoughts on the same books – and agree, disagree, or not care – my hope, though, is that she reads with a voracious hunger that knows no satiety. I’ve pulled no punches in my reviews, and used language I can’t imagine coming one day from my daughter’s mouth, but I’ve tried to be as honest – and pithy – as possible. I want my daughter, if she were to read my perspective on any given book, to know that I would say the same things to her about my thoughts on the book as she would read here. It’s personal, yes, but our response to a book is nothing less than that. So this is the first admission for those of you that follow, read and comment on my thoughts (and thank you, always) – I think it is important to understand more about why I write and what I write.

The other important thing I want to say (before telling you why everyone must read this fantastic book) is that I am a man that is trying very hard to understand more about women; to be sensitive to all of the things I can’t ever truly know and be conscious of my being in the time and place I happen to live – and my responsibilities as a human male. I am a true believer that if men hadn’t subjugated women since the time of sentience that the world would be a much better place. I learn so much from my wife and my daughter, and I see the world through their eyes in a way so different from my own and this allows me to grow in ways that I could never achieve through my own gender filters.

So it was with great excitement that I accepted GR friend Aubrey’s invitation to the 500 Great Books By Women. If you aren’t already a member, I highly recommend you become one. As the moderator Aubrey has had the brilliance of allowing additional female authors to be added to this initial list via submissions of group members, so this will be a constantly expanding canon of must-reads. When approaching this list, I decided that my prejudices were too strong, and that to pick something to read would require randomness; otherwise I would look for authors I knew and perhaps miss some jewels I wouldn’t typically read. I asked my wife to pick a number between 1 and 500. The number she chose landed me here at Copper Crown.

I often wonder what makes a book become a classic and why so many others – even better than those we revere – become BURIED. This novel is an expertly written and beautiful homage to friendship. Set in rural Texas in the early 1900s, the story follows two friends (one white, one black) in a violent and oppressive environment. The difference between drama and melodrama can be razor thin; von Herzon writes tone-perfect sentences and creates rich characters that make the reader wish this book was 1,000 pages.

I hope, years from now, if Goodreads still exists and my daughter finds her way to this website, to this particular page, that she will read this review and then choose to read this book. If I’m still in this world, perhaps we can discuss it. I won’t forget it anytime soon – and I certainly plan to return to it again in the future.

Happy reading, Sunshine. May your world be filled with as many books like Copper Crown that your library can hold.


(And apologies to all of you GR friends for the lengthy and overtly personal review – I really do hope that others of you will read this book!)

1st book read of 500 Great Books By Women

[Danielle · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is not a story for me. I was drawn to the early-20th century time period and the interracial friendship touted on the back cover. But the 1913-1932 setting really had very little bearing on the story.

I can handle some of the overblown prose, and even some seeing of spirits. But. It all just goes too far and what's the point?

I can't believe that Skeet wouldn't try to rape Cass for fourteen years. It's just that the plot needed Cass and Allie to have enough money saved by the time he did it.

What was the point of Thane and that whole non-story? Like, at all?

I don't understand how Cass thought she hadn't earned any of the money that Allie was sending her when *they had been running a successful business together for years.* Where was the sense of accomplishment after all the hard work? Allie was supposed to be doing it all single handedly when Cass left? I can't believe they wouldn't have hired any staff and built a community of people around the restaurant.

There just could have been so much more to their story. Instead we get spirits serving tea (and eating cake at the end there!) and Lloyd painting one canvas over and over and Cass dying in a never-worn wedding dress at the age of thirty-four.

I'm just astounded that that's the story this author wanted to tell. Since it's based on her family, maybe that's why Cass or Ruby doesn't ever fall in love and no one is ever truly happy or anything. If it's going to be that realistic, you gotta give me something else to *enjoy* or at least appreciate about it. Alas.

[LJ P · Rating 3 out of 5]

Beautifully written. "I tried hating Skeet one time, but I couldn't keep up with it. That kind of venom, it took too much out of me. Maybe I could've stood up under it if I had believed he'd been devil-bought, from his hat to his boots. But the thing was, even bad people weren't bad all the time. And even when they were doing bad things, maybe they weren't damned through and through. Maybe God saw a single, solitary iota of goodness beating in the heart of them somewhere - and maybe that was enough for a person to get themselves a forgiveness."

[Deborah Magone · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read this in 1993 as a young Mother and couldn't put it down! Finished it in 2 days. Riveting! Just thought about telling a friend about it for a holiday gift idea and thought I'd leave a long over due review. Thank You for my autographed copy Lane !

[Ronalee · Rating 3 out of 5]

Overly fanciful, bordering on fairy tale. Timeline particularly didn’t make sense as their time of financial abundance would have correlated to the start of the Great Depression. Way too many ghosts.

[Sophia · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book. It was a quick historical fiction read. Rural Texas in the 1920's era. I loved the themes of challenging societal standards and norms. I also liked the journal entry style of storytelling; Short snippets of different parts of the story meant the descriptions didn't drag on far beyond what was needed to get a good picture of the environment.

This book has a good healthy element of ghost characters. The line was perfectly blurred between real and supernatural.

[Patti Best · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have been unpacking my books that have been in storage for the last eight years. I'm finding old friends. If you are looking for a book that brings home the strength of women's friendships, this should be your next read

[Janet]

Potential Diva Book Group 2009

[Mary FitzSimons · Rating 4 out of 5]

(It's titled Copper Crown, not The Copper Crown, as GoodReads lists it....)

[Betsy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a hidden gem! Highly recommended!