When I grew up, the surfaces of my childhood were sand, scraggly Bermuda grass, and gravelly asphalt for roads. My parents, who grew up back East, had skills that I never had an opportunity to learn as a child, such as roller skating. Even learning to ride a bike was a fairly dodgy proposition. And one of those old school skills, for my Dad, was shooting marbles. I understand he was pretty damned good at it. The “Marble”, in the title of this book, is that kind of marble, and said company was a very lucrative one.
But let’s back up. Loyal Ledford has returned, after serving in WWII, to the hills of West Virginia and is troubled by the Jim Crow society that he had accepted as the norm before he left. He returns to his job at Mann Glass works, but is looking for a better life. This is when he meets up with his cousins, the mysterious and half indigenous Bonecutter brothers, Wimpy and Dimple (some real Reservation Dogs vibes with these two). They own Marrowbone Cut, an untouched valley, that is the land Ledford has been looking for. Along with a black friend and coworker, and their respective families, they establish the Marrowbone Marble Company, producer of the finest marbles anywhere. Though most other residents in the area scorn them, they eventually entice other like-minded folk, many unlikely allies, to join them. But through the 50s and 60s, violence is never far away.
I remember those years, but this was a very different perspective than one I ever knew, isolated, but not entirely cut off from the outside world. Wish I still had my Dad’s marbles.