Empty Places: 10/11/16

Empty Places by Kathy Cannon Wiechman is set in a fictional mining town in Harlan County, Kentucky in 1932. Adabel and her siblings are trying to survive the Great Depression and their abusive, alcoholic father.

Adabel can deal with the dwindling food sources and her increasingly erratic father. What has her on edge is how she can't remember her mother — the woman she's named for. Ada left her family a few years back and while Adabel's siblings all seem to have at least one memory of her, she has none.

The empty places are the spots where Adabel should remember and can't — moments of time — moments of love — that are just gone. This book then follows over the course of a about a year where Adabel tries to track down what happened to her mother so she can fill in those empty places.

All of this is set against the danger and poverty of the coal mining in Appalachia. The author includes an afterword, bibliography, and historical photographs. I also suggest listening to the song, "You'll Never Leave Harlan Alive" to set the mood.

Anderson Family Bluegrass - You'll Never Leave Harlan Alive

Three stars

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