This book served me a whole lot of southern vibes!
Set in Mississippi in the 1950s, it tells the story of a small town where the color of your skin dictated the treatment you got. Old family secrets and poor choices are the makings of this story. When, Valuable, a sixteen year old girl, gets pregnant and everyone in town knows that she's no stranger to her boyfriend Jackson, because 'em gray eyes speak of the same father. An unlikely friendship forms between Valuable; Joody Two Sun (who seems to know everything including the future), Even Grade, Canaan, Grace and Joleb.
The events after this build up on a simple question 'how far would you be willing to go for the one you care about?'
I loved the accent of the characters. Canaan is judgmental and he offers no apologies for it. Grace is forthright and forceful and she talks back to any white folk, including her employers when they make wrong decisions. Joody is mystical, what with the visions, rocks and chanting around open fire? Even...well, he's contemplative and I enjoyed their bantering with Canaan! Honey, Even thought, Lord have mercy, the man said honey.
This book is not for the impatient- entertain me now, kind of reader (if there is such), but it is a book that tells of the story of humanity, a true form of kindness that springs up in people we least thought it would.

It took me awhile to get into this book - lots of characters and story lines that constantly converge and then move away to their own story line. Very well written and dense, not a quick read at all for me. It's basically a story about connections and what makes up family and love. Hard to believe it was this lady's first book.

Not for me.

This book came recommended. I tried really hard to get into and finally gave up. Too strange for me. I could't connect with the characters.

The book takes you on the direction of learning about some amazing characters, the profiles and the descriptive language is done nicely. Learning about a young girl who has been left by her mother on many occasions and seeing how Valuable grows and learns about life. The reader learns about the many unique names given to the characters and the journey they took. The reader believes the story is about one when it turns and becomes about many of the characters and how they intertwine.

Fantastic Fiction
Capturing all the rueful irony and racial ambivalence of small-town Mississippi in the late 1950s, Melinda Haynes' celebrated novel is a wholly unforgettable exploration of family, identity, and redemption. Mother of Pearl revolves around twenty-eight-year-old Even Grade, a black man who grew up an orphan, and Valuable Korner, the fifteen-year-old white daughter of the town whore and an unknown father. Both are passionately determined to discover the precious things neither experienced as children: human connection, enduring commitment, and, above all, unconditional love. A startlingly accomplished mixture of beauty, mystery, and tragedy, Mother of Pearl marks the debut of an extraordinary literary talent.

Hard to get into. Lots of characters. A girl and boy in a small town grow up together not knowing they’re brother and sister. The girl gets pregnant. The little town helps the girl through her journey.

I have never in my life left a book review. After finishing this book and then searching for reviews and realizing I wasn’t alone in my thoughts on this book I felt compelled to leave one. Glad to read I wasn’t the only one that had to sludge through several chapters to even get interested in reading the book. There was no flow to the sentence structure and I was annoyed I had to concentrate so hard to figure out what anything even meant. It did get better. I kept plodding along because I didn’t have another book available. Also relieved to know I wasn’t the only one that didn’t understand some of the sentences that seemed like random words put together as if the author just didn’t take the time to think of more meaningful words for whatever profound statement she thought she was making. So many characters that I figured would come together at the end and they did I guess. The last chapter and epilogue seemed random though. And what the hell was the business of the sow in people’s dreams??? I feel like that was nevered answered.

The plot is woven around the two main characters (Even Grade and Valuable Korner) and a witch, a goat, and some wise old people who live in a quirky little southern town in the 1950's. The plot is full of twists that are shocking, humorous, and heart breaking.

I read this book with a friend and had a blast. I loved this book because it was very literary... full of symbols, motifs, allusions, and figurative language that allows the reader to explore many levels of interpretation. Definitely a book that needs to be read more than once to fully appreciate and understand its different levels.

This is a lazy meandering river of a book in which rivers and water in general are constant themes. However, the slow progression of the story perfectly evoked the pace of life, I imagine, in the late ‘50s in a southern small town. I have never been to Mississippi, but I was there in this book. I felt the oppressive heat and the slow pace of day-to-day life. It took me a while to get through Mother of Pearl and I typically devour books. Now and again though, it’s good to read a book that is hard work. The characters were so beautifully complex and the writing so breathtakingly beautiful. I often stopped dead in my tracks to re-read a passage or paragraph such as,

She smelled cigarette smoke and wet leaves and rot - those dank smells that live a narrow life at the edge of moving water. The crickets and frogs were loud here ... .Here their chorus seemed unrehearsed and untethered to anything resembling order. Everything at that other place seemed preordained and connected to some antique notch in time that rolled around once or twice a millennium.

Nonetheless I was left with a couple of disappointments in the end as certain secrets were left untold and unresolved. Upon reflection, however, I feel that Melinda Hayes’ decision to do so was appropriate given the time and place where generations of scandal were kept hidden in order to save face and actually survive in the community. As there are so many secrets and scandals in Mother of Pearl, I think it would have been unrealistic to end a story such as this with everything neatly packaged up with a bow on top. Life isn’t like that.

This book certainly isn’t for everyone but I loved it.

A beautiful story, beautifully written, of how a multi-racial group of loners and outcasts come together as a family in a small Mississippi town in the 1950's. One of the things I particularly love about this book is how you stumble upon charm in unexpected places -- e.g., the courtship of Louise Green and Mr. Willard, funeral director (ch. 30); Protestant Joleb's talk with Russ, the priest, about race, religion, family, and mental health (ch. 29); Canaan's coming to terms with what it means to be Black, and the irrelevance of Grace's illiteracy (ch. 28). These little insights into the characters and their world give the book an extraordinary depth as a picture of the small-town South in which I grew up (though admittedly I had little direct contact with my segregated home town's Black residents). Melinda Haynes' own background gives her observations a particular authenticity (though her vision of cross-racial family love might be somewhat aspirational). But I loved the book and the characters, their struggles to rebel against and adapt to an unfriendly world -- five enthusiastic stars.

Wow, I almost kept a journal while I was reading this book just to keep track of my thoughts about it. I generally do not like to read "Oprah" books but I really found this book full of great characters that you wanted to know more about. It took me about 50-60 pages to really get into it and once I was I didn't want to put it down.

I felt so awful for the majority of the characters and the issues they were dealing with (don't want to give anything away till Katie reads it!) I loved Valuable and her sadness towards her family. You just wanted to reach out and help the girl.

I think it was very good at describing what was happening in the book, how people were feeling etc...

When I finished it last night I wanted to call Brittany to talk about it! Eeeek! I was not expecting that ending and would like to go into more detail later about it. I didn't think it was fair to some of the characters.........

A wonderful book but not for everyone. I can see a lot of readers having a hard time with this novel. Sad but hopeful Southern Gothic story that the writer webs a collection of family and friends into a complex but compelling tribute to the South of Mississippi. Hard to start but impossible to stop after about 70 pages.