Getting Mother's Body: A Novel

by Suzan-Lori Parks

Book Overview

Billy Beede, the teenage daughter of the fast-running, no-account, and six-years-dead Willa Mae, comes home one day to find a fateful letter waiting for her: Willa Mae’s burial spot in LaJunta,... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 081296800X
• Release Date: April 2004
• Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks
• Length: 288 Pages
• Weight: 2.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.0" x 0.6" x 5.2"

Customer Reviews

A Must Read Book

I read this book in 2 days, it was that good. This book had me wanting to read more with each page I turned. Billy is a smart and determined young woman who is NOT AFRAID of nothing. She started out (in my opinion) as an ungrateful, nonchalant, spoiled niece that didn't care abt anything or anyone but herself. Towards the end of the book, I began to see a smart girl who knew how to outwit others, she took alot of what she had learned from her mother and applied to her own struggles to get things done, not just for her but for her uncle and aunt also. I laughed at times when reading this book, definitely couldn't put it down. The end will shock you!!! Lesson I think being taught, never give up on what you set out to do, you never know the outcome God has already prepared for you. Watch those you who thght really cared abt your loved ones, did they really care or did they just take with no remorse?

Getting Mother's Body

Getting Mother's Body tells the story of Billy Beade and her family and friends on a road trip to dig up the treasure buried with Billy's mother Willa Mae. Each is equally desperate for the money from the treasure, but all for different reasons. The story was exciting, hardly ever predictable, and intelligent. Lately, I've been tired of picking up novels that seemed interesting, only to find wooden characters, well-worn plot devices, and cliched dialogue. Not here. Ms. Parks has created a stunning cast of characters, each beautifully developed to the perfect degree to fit the plot, no more, no less. The story is written from Mulitple view points, each providing a small glimpse at the larger picture of the story. For this novel, however, the whole is greater than the some of it's parts - each point of view provides enough of the plot that the reader can synthesize them into a whole. This is a novel for a reader who doesn't want everything handed to them on the page, who enjoys synthesizing information to come to thier own conclusions. I have recommended this novel to many friends and family with much success. highly recommended.

Don't Judge them, just ENJOY them

I just discovered your website, or I would have written a year ago, when I read the book. I read an excerpt of it in Essence magazine while on a cruise in May 2003 and I bought the hard cover as soon as I got home. I give it 5 stars only because I can't give 6! I thoroughly enjoyed this novel and just recently mailed it to my friend in Florida. I told her not to judge the characters-just enjoy them! Many people in the book are "mojo"-meaning 'slow' and/or ignorant but I got a kick out of each and every one of them. What a refreshing book! I'll be looking out for more novels by Ms Parks.

Fun, Adventurous novel

Full of gossip and adventure, Getting Mother's Body is the story of a few small-town folks with big dreams. Billy Beede, the daughter of six-years dead Willa Mae Beede finds herself in this novel. Pregnant and given a deadline of one week, Billy needs abortion money fast. Uncle and aunt in tow, they set off on a mission that leads from Texas to Arizona to dig up Willa Mae's body and the rumored treasure that was buried with her. Along the way this sad group of Beedes reminise over the life and tragic death of Willa Mae and how their own lifes have changed over the years. Dill Smiles, Willa Mae's lover, has a secret of her own though, and with murder on her mind sets off hot on Billy's trail. This book was a really fun read. I enjoyed each and every page. Good authors make their characters real and Parks does this grandly, I could even feel the Arizona heat and Texas dust. Don't browse over this novel. Superb!

All's Well That Ends Well

"Where my panties at?" are the great opening lines of this wondrous comic novel; but you "aint seen nothing" yet. The critics insist on saying Ms. Parks is influenced here by William Faulkner's AS I LAY DYING, something I don't see much of although I did hear her in an interview recently say nice things about Faulkner. Ms. Parks is certainly a classy lady.And she has written a classy novel. Billy Beede, named after Billie Holiday in spite of the spelling of her first name, is sixteen, unmarried and pregnant. She is joined by a host of other motley characters: Dill Smiles. . . "the most honest person I know, even if she ain't nothing but a bulldagger." Then there's Roosevelt Beede, a minister who no longer preaches; his wife June Flowers Beede, who only has one leg; Laz Jackson, named for Lazarus in the New Testament because he was born not breathing, who wants to marry Billy even though he is not the father of her unborn child--actually he's still a virgin when the novel begins--and of course Willa Mae Beede, Billy's mother and Dill's former lover, who is now in her grave and may have been buried with previous gems. There are several other minor characters, just as interesting, not the least of which is Homer Beede Rochfoucault, the son of a Morehouse man and a Spelman graduate. There's also a sympathetic white deputy sheriff, someone we might not expect to find in 1963, the year this novel takes place.Told from several points of view-- perhaps the writer is influenced by Faulkner after all-- the novel ultimately is about the importance of family. These characters-- most of them either dirt poor or, in the case of Homer and his mother, people who have suffered a reversal of fortune-- are as strong as the state of Texas. Like Faulkner's Dilsey in THE SOUND AND THE FURY, they endure.That Ms. Parks first made her mark as a dramatist-- she won the Pulitzer for her play TOPDOG/UNDERDOG-- is obvious from the language here as one dialogue builds on another.For all these characters' misfortunes-- and they suffer many-- you will feel good about the ending of this story. Billy says: "Going back home we made good time. I think we did all right." Ms. Parks does much better than "all right" in this poignant, bittersweet novel.

If Mother Only Knew...

Playwright Suzan-Lori Parks?s debut novel, Getting Mother?s Body, has an affinity to William Faulkner?s classic, As I Lay Dying, only this time, Parks has flipped the script in a couple of areas. First, instead of taking a body home to be buried, the characters are planning to exhume the remains of one ?high-strung, party girl/singer?, Willa Mae Beede; and secondly, the characters are African American, the setting is 1963 rural Texas, and the lead character is Billy Beede, a poor pregnant, unwed, high school dropout. After her mother?s (Willa Mae) untimely demise, Billy returns to Lincoln by her mother?s lesbian lover, Dill Smiles, to live with her maternal uncle, Roosevelt, and his wife, June, in their trailer behind a gas station. Billy becomes pregnant by a married man and believes an abortion will solve all of her problems. To get the money for the procedure, she plans a journey back to Arizona to recover the small fortune (a pearl necklace and diamond ring) which according to Dill adorns Willa Mae?s corpse. Billy is accompanied by an eccentric cast of characters, each with selfish desires for the treasure, each hoping it will ?fill a hole.? These ?holes? run deep ranging from pride, envy, debt to lust, unrequited love, childlessness, and spiritual loss. Billy becomes an expert in recognizing ?holes,? i.e. finding one?s weaknesses, and uses her ?gift? to manipulate her family and strangers to get what she wants?unknowingly becoming more like the con artist mother that she despises. This novel, told in first person by each lead character, causes the reader to experience the journey from differing viewpoints. Often times, the chapters represent character perspectives of the same event granting the reader the opportunity to ?hear? multiple sides of the story. The author even interjects observations, blues songs, and ominous passages by the deceased Willa Mae. The use of monologues allows the reader to learn firsthand each character?s motivation, vulnerabilities, and haunted pasts; these elements contributed to the novel?s well developed characters. This reviewer also enjoyed the writing style and the extensive use of regional dialect to add realism to the dialogue. Without a clue on how this story was going to end until the end, I was happy that the journey ultimately brought about some semblance of absolution and redemption for the motley crew, which was a welcomed relief for an otherwise dismal tale. There is a lot more to this story than this review covers; one has to read to appreciate all the author has to offer. Ms. Parks shows great promise and if you enjoy deviating from the ?relationship drama? of modern contemporary fiction, you may enjoy this book. I think readers who enjoyed eclectic works like Lolita Files?s Child of God and Olympia Vernon?s Eden might appreciate this novel.PhyllisAPOOO BookClub, The Nubian Circle Book Club