Thirty years after leaving Eunola, Mississippi, to pursue her dreams of becoming a dancer, Leland Standard returns with her son, and a dinner party given in her honor brings to light the secrets, desires, and life stories of the guests
I am somewhat ashamed to admit to having read this book, as it contained some very graphic sexual passages that I found quite offensive. It also contained some intriguing southern characters, so I guess that is why I read it, nonetheless. I found the characters to be strong, the story line weak. I always say that if I start reading something I almost always finish it because I invariably get at least one valuable thing from any book. For me, in this book, that one thing was a quote that, being from the South, I found insightfully true and probably the thesis for the book.
"Leland had not lost the knack of maneuvering through southern conversation. The trick was to ignore subtext and focus on chatter as if chatter were the point, meantime keeping steady in mind the fact that subtext was everything."