This was our March book club selection, and I really enjoyed it. I read the author’s debut novel, Black Cake, in February and I feel like she resolved all the issues I had with her writing in that novel here. If anything, I think she could have devoted a bit more time to the past but she genuinely made me care about the present day characters.
Good Dirt in this case refers to clay, and a family’s historical legacy that they trace back to an ancestor who escaped from a pottery in South Carolina. With him, he brought a 20 gallon jar, and over the decades and generations that jar has held a place of honor in the homes and stories of his descendants.
The modern day uses multiple points of view but the main story centers around Ebby, the most recent descendant of the man that brought the jar north. Her parents on both sides have a deep interest in their family history and have families with deep roots in their communities, even if their heritage and background don’t get the same respect as white families with similarly long histories in New England. Ebby’s family has found success and wealth and generally done well for themselves but Ebby is also very much traumatized and shaped by a tragedy that took place when she was 8, a home invasion gone wrong that ended with her big brother murdered, the family jar shattered. By the time the reader meets Ebby, she is in the French countryside, escaping from life after being stood up on her wedding day.
The present day deals with legacy, guilt and grief as we get multiple other perspectives and view points, gaining more insights into Ebby’s family and the tragedy that defined her life.
Interspersed throughout is the story of the jar – from the events and circumstances that would lead to its creation, its journey North and how it was such a central piece of the family history. This part of the story was very well done but it does primarily focus on that first generation or so. This isn’t like Homegoing where we hear from every generation that the jar has passed through. And while Homegoing emphasized the loss of knowledge and disconnect from generation to generation because of the horrors of slavery and how it separated families, in this one, we get to see a family that was able to hold onto history, all the way back to the woman human trafficked from Africa.