I almost didn't finish this but I'm glad I did. The latter half of the book picked up the pace and was worth the wait. ( )

Such an amazing story about strength in the face of adversity. Overcoming hatred with love. The power of a woman and what she will do to stand up for her family.

This story is told from multiple perspectives and unlike most books it doesn’t become confusing. It adds to the story, making it more personable. ( )

When I started this book I thought it was kind of boring. Boy was I wrong. This is an amazing story with a few true facts thrown in about the Klu Kluck Klan and the things that had happed in the 60 's, 70's and even 2017. It was for me a mystery and a thriller not knowing what was going to happen next. I was a little disappointed in the end. Because I always want things to turn out good for everyone. I really liked the main characters and was pulled into there lives. I would definitely recommend this book. 4 stars for sure. ( )

Though it has echoes of Emma Donoghue’s Room, this novel is a cautionary tale about the rise of white supremacy.

Though it is 2017, five years after losing her husband and son in an accident, Imogene Coulter is still grieving. Then she finds a young child living in the locked basement of a boarded-up house on her family property. Who is he and how did he come to be there? Imogene is convinced that her father, Grand Wizard of the Knights of the Southern Georgia Order, who just died, was involved in keeping the child captive. Though Imogene has rejected her family’s racism, her family has a long connection to the Ku Klux Klan, and her brother Eddie, sister Jo Lynne, and brother-in-law Garland are active members of the KKK.

Besides Imogene’s story, we are given the perspective of Tillie, Imogene’s father-in-law, who left the Klan forty years earlier. And then there’s the first-person narration of Beth, a ten-year-old girl, who was abducted from her home in 2010. What happened to Beth since the child in the basement is a young boy named Christopher? Who is the boy’s Mama whom Christopher claims is always brought back to the basement?

There are major plausibility problems with the plot. It is unbelievable that Imogene does not realize the identity of the person keeping Christopher captive. Imogene’s mother seems almost totally oblivious to what is happening around her. Beth’s behaviour in the last scene which she narrates doesn’t make sense. A policeman who has lived in the town for ten years is so naïve about the actions of the Klan in his town?

Mystery is the technique used to create suspense, but in many ways, the author’s message takes precedence over the narrative. The title, for example, refers to people not paying sufficient attention to the rise of white nationalism: “Regardless of when it first began, Tillie didn’t see it coming, this rising of the Klan yet again, because he had let himself get rusty. For too many years, those sorts had been out of sight, and so they were out of mind too. For too many years, he’s been gone too long from paying attention. A lot of folks have been gone too long.”

Interspersed throughout the book are short chapters outlining the history of the Ku Klux Klan. The last of these chapters mentions the 2017 rally in Charlottesville and the white supremacists’ praising President Trump for refusing to specifically hold them accountable for what happened. The last page of the novel has an explicit warning: “while those men no longer march past, dressed in their robes and hoods and carrying torches, they’re still out there, just underfoot.”

This book has an important message; unfortunately, that theme is developed in an unwieldy fashion. The novel has much real-world resonance so I wish it were of better literary quality.

Note: Please check out my reader's blog (https://schatjesshelves.blogspot.com/) and follow me on Twitter (@DCYakabuski). ( )

Told from three different points of view, this book takes place in 2010 and 2018. It tells the story of one girl and one woman who are connected by family. Beth is taken from her home in 2010 when someone kills her babysitter who is Peurto Rican in an attempt to get the baby sitter's father to stop teaching at the local college in Georgia. Since Beth is a witness and a white one at that the man can't kill her too. So he takes her to a basement and keeps her captive.

Imogene is related to the man who took Beth. Imogene has had to deal with being the child of her mother and another man who raped her mother. She is the much younger sister to Jo Lynne and Eddie whose father Ed Coulter was the leader of the local chapter of the KKK. Imogene's chapters take place in 2018 and she is still dealing with the death of her husband, Russell, and young son, Vaughn which happened five years ago. She drinks too much and sleeps with a variety of men.

Imogene is asked by her mother to cut the electrical wire to her old dead grandfather's house that was used for Klan business. Now that her husband Ed is dead she is stopping the Klan from meeting on her property. When Imogene goes to the house and investigates she finds a young boy in the basement. He is about five or six years old and believes that his mother will come back soon. That the man who takes her away always brings her back. He lets slip that Ed is the name of the man who has been keeping him and when shown a picture of her daddy, Ed, he recognizes him as the man who has been keeping them.

Someone burns down the building the same night that Imogene finds the boy. The third voice in this story is Tillie, Imogene's father-in-law and the owner of a pawnshop that Imogene helps out at by looking for any insurance claims on the items that are being sold. Tillie left the Klan forty years ago because of something awful that happened one night that haunts him still. He has a problem because Natalie, Tim Robithan's girlfriend tried to pawn two watches that belong to Tim's dad a big man in the Klan who is probably taking over now that Ed is dead since his son is a pretty useless man.

Interspersed between the voices are segments about the history of the Klan that are very interesting. This is a powerful book that explores the life of being in the Klan because Imogene's brother and sister are both in the Klan, even though Imogene hates it with a passion just like her mother. Beth tries her best to make the man who took her happy because she knows that's her only way of staying alive. Her story is tragic and told with bold strokes that belie her tender years. This is a great book that demands to be read. I give it five out of five stars.

Quotes

The man’s voice flows out of him like warm gravy. That’s what Mama says about a Southern man’s voice. Like warm, peppery gravy that’ll leave you craving more and give you heartburn all the same.

-Lori Roy (Gone Too Long p 17)

She told me to talk like I’m a rose, sweet and flowery, to men like this, but to be a cactus inside.

-Lori Roy (Gone Too Long p 315) ( )