(Reviewed by JD Jung)
“They probably hauled him to the city lockup for the weekend. He ain’t the first busted-ass sharecropper in Scots Station to get run on a rail for stealing and owing money.”
November 1926, Central Alabama – Molly Lingo’s mother had no idea how far plantation owner Zachary Hinton would go to punish her husband. After his murder, and with her mother’s consent, Hinton took Molly to work at a brothel to pay the family’s debt owed him.
Poker was big business at the brothel and after a game gone sour, gambler Cotton Arnold ran out. Unbeknownst to him, Molly wasn’t far behind and after an altercation and a stolen car, these two were on the run.
This story takes us through the rural South following a teenage girl who must grow up fast. We follow Molly from her work at the brothel and as she and Cotton head North to escape their predators and the law.
I feel that The Parlor Girl’s Guide is an odd title for this book as in addition to the story of finding out what happens to Molly, we learn about the income and social inequality that affected poor whites due to abuses in the tenant farming system. We also witness Southern white men exhibiting overt racist and misogynistic behavior. Some of that was hard to read.
It’s important that the reader refer to the links provided in the book as it rounds out for us what was happening at the time. The author explains Molly’s actions in a historical and socioeconomic context. He gives more detail on the tenant farming system and how religion and superstition played a part in the culture. He explains how the beginning of the Jazz Age affected the South in different ways than in Northern cities like New York, and how that contributed to the drug culture of the time. Finally, he explains why he put baseball legend Ty Cobb in the story and what he represents.
The well-developed characters complement the strong plot and rural southern setting. Unfortunately, I found the ending to be abrupt which was disappointing. However, the fast-paced story was worth the ride, and overall worth the time.
