Glow

Glow by Jessica Maria Tuccelli is a first novel by the author.  I felt like her writing shows great promise, but

the story ended up being very confusing.  There is a genealogical family chart at the beginning of the book, and I found myself checking it two or three times while reading each chapter trying to keep the characters and their connections straight in my head.  And this is from a fairly seasoned genealogist who is having this trouble. The story travels through seven generations of two Southern families, who inter-married, along with the slave/master relationships.  Very confusing.

The story began in 1941 with Ella McGee, an eleven year old girl, being sent on a bus from Washington DC to her Southern hometown in Georgia.  When Ella arrived at her destination, she was not met at the bus depot and began walking, ending up being missing as far as her family knew.  Turns out that Ella ended up in the home of two elderly women, who have stories and magic/mysticism. 

The book covers from 1836 up to 1941.  It is too bad that the book ended up so difficult to read, because I do think that the author had some great stories to tell.  It was just too much for one book.