Sisterly love is not always simple and steadfast. Disturbing in its portrayal of tolerant blindness to race as part of the problem of racial hatred, Night Talk traces the friendship of two girls, one white and one black, as they grow up in the same environment but in different worlds. Janey's mother is the housemaid for Evie and her mother. Evie accepts Janey readily into her world and as her roommate, a secret that must be kept from the neighbors. Yet Janey begins to view Evie's acceptance of her as blind to the issues of society and race. The rift between them reaches a critical test when Janey, as an adult, is accused of murder.


From School Library Journal
YA?The day Evie's father leaves home, Volusia, their maid, and Janey Louise, her daughter, move into the house. At first, both sleep in the room off the kitchen, but after a while Janey Louise moves into Evie's bedroom, and the night talk begins. In a small Georgia town in 1949, white and colored do not share a room, much less their secrets. But over the years, Volusia and Agnes, Evie's mother, become friends and business partners and Evie and Janey Louise share their feelings about boys, their worries about school, and their thoughts about their families. Evie's parents eventually divorce, and her younger brother struggles with polio. At first, the girls go to different schools, but Janey Louise and another student begin the 1956 school year by integrating the high school, accompanied by the press and the National Guard. Violent reprisals result, and the bond between the two girls is strained as their own fears and prejudices surface. The story of this enduring friendship spans a period of 40 years, and is told with humor, understanding, and compassion. YAs will be caught up in this tale of two young women struggling against the reality of black and white society in the civil rights era. Its lessons about love, friendship, and the cost of being different are unforgettable.?Molly Connally, Kings Park Library, Fairfax County, VACopyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Library Journal
This affecting, resonant, but confusingly structured story tells of two girls, the women they become, and the friendship they share through awkward years and shattering experiences. Janey Louise, who is black, and narrator Evie, who is white, grow up in 1950s Mercy, Georgia, under the loving but troubled watch of their mothers, who share a special and dangerous friendship. As an adult, Evie relates the stories of these mothers and daughters, mixed in with her adult experiences and punctuated by girlhood and adulthood letters to her absent father. The amazing ways of nature?growth and death, pond life and insect behavior?and the terrible ways of humankind?racial strife, lynching, rape, and mere ignorance and growing apart?are recorded with a clarity only slightly clouded by frequent jumps in time frame. Reminiscent of To Kill a Mockingbird, this moving novel will benefit most public library collections. Recommended.?Janet Ingraham, Worthington P.L., OhioCopyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.


The Boston Globe, Renee Graham
...Cox is a graceful writer who confronts a difficult issue, and handles it with pathos and recognition.


From Kirkus Reviews
Friendship across the great racial divide of the South is sensitively addressed in a novel that tries too hard to make a moving tale profound. Cox (Familiar Ground, 1984, etc.) here uses an awkward formula--letters to a father written in childhood mixed with alternating segments on the past and the immediate present--to tell the story of white Evie Bell and black Janey. The writing tends toward the awkward as well (``I missed his brows that could bring a soft rain'') as Cox strains for meaning and effect. It all begins with the funeral in Mercy, Georgia, of Volusia, Janey's mother, who for 12 years had been not only Evie's mother's housekeeper but best friend. When August, Evie's biologist father, left for good, Volusia and Janey moved in and shared the family house. Janey was also soon sharing Evie's room--though no one in the town was supposed to know: It was the '50s, and while the struggle for civil rights was becoming more evident, the South was still rigidly segregated. At night, after the lights were out, the two girls loved to talk, and each day after school they played together. But as Evie, now a teacher in Texas, visits her mother and Volusia's grieving second husband, she recalls--seeing Janey again--how difficult it was to keep up that close rapport as the outside world intervened. When Janey was 16, her brother Albert, a decorated Korean War hero, was badly beaten for his civil rights activities, and Janey was raped--events that served to strain the girls' friendship badly. Now, the murder of a white man on the eve of Volusia's funeral, a murder that Janey is accused of before being exonerated, reveals hidden secrets and renews the old, essential ties. An affecting celebration of the resilience of friendship, but undercut by its stock characters, who, despite nods to Faulkner and other southern greats, remain flat and unsurprising. -- Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.


From Independent Publisher
If Studs Terkel is right that race is the American obsession, then writing that explicates the racist foundations of our social order should be encouraged and heralded. Night Talk, Elizabeth Cox's third novel, is such writing. Powerful and intensely affecting, it follows two intertwined families - one African American and the other white - through four decades in tiny, rural Mercy, Georgia. And what decades they are! Readers will visit (or re-visit) the early years of the civil rights movement and bear witness to the inroads that have been made in reducing racial bigotry. In addition, the book assesses the backlash engendered by these movements and highlights the vast gulf that continues to separate black from white. At the center of the tale are two woman-headed families, the Bells and the Davis'. Brought together in 1949 after white, middle-class August Bell abandons his wife and kids, the story follows the Bell's housekeeper, Volusia Davis, and her daughter, Janey Louise, from the time they move into the Bell's home until 1991. While outsiders initially view the living arrangement as that of employer/servant, over time the evident closeness of the families becomes the subject of gossip and racist derision. This puts the Bells in a quandary: Do they risk alienating their white friends and neighbors, or do they take a stand that will be both provocative and dangerous? Night Talk is a spectacular look at the power of friendship, but it never lets its white characters off the hook. The Bell's racial privilege, despite their genuine affection for Volusia and Janey Louise, illustrates the racism at the core of most white lives. Yet the book retains an incredible optimism that the indignities of white supremacy and racial prejudice can be healed by words if people are open to listening and really hearing what needs to be said. This premise makes the novel's heartfelt belief that racial equity is possible deeply moving and exuberantly encouraging.


Review
"Wise and touching...about love in all shapes and shades and forms." --Jill McKorkle

"Elizabeth Cox never writes of a character whom she cannot, literally, inhabit. That beautiful property of her mind is visible throughout Night Talk; and so far as I can understand her craft, it operates through an intensity of gazing at a particular man, woman or child till the gaze has entered the imagined skull and created an imagined-but entirely convincing-mind within. I read her for the richness of her report on the interiors of widely different human beings, all of whom are worth watching."-Reynolds Price

"Cox puts a human face on the struggle for equality in this thoughtful, well-written exploration of race relations in the South."-The News and Observer (Raleigh)

"Affecting, resonant . . . Reminiscent of To Kill a Mockingbird."-Library Journal

"Cox . . . knows how friendships shift and change, grow cold and then rediscover warmth . . . An involving tale of two women's friendship in a world defined by race but illuminated by love."-Booklist



Review
"Wise and touching...about love in all shapes and shades and forms." --Jill McKorkle

"Elizabeth Cox never writes of a character whom she cannot, literally, inhabit. That beautiful property of her mind is visible throughout Night Talk; and so far as I can understand her craft, it operates through an intensity of gazing at a particular man, woman or child till the gaze has entered the imagined skull and created an imagined-but entirely convincing-mind within. I read her for the richness of her report on the interiors of widely different human beings, all of whom are worth watching."-Reynolds Price

"Cox puts a human face on the struggle for equality in this thoughtful, well-written exploration of race relations in the South."-The News and Observer (Raleigh)

"Affecting, resonant . . . Reminiscent of To Kill a Mockingbird."-Library Journal

"Cox . . . knows how friendships shift and change, grow cold and then rediscover warmth . . . An involving tale of two women's friendship in a world defined by race but illuminated by love."-Booklist



Book Description
Recently Nominated for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, Night Talk has served as an inspiration for honest discussions of race around the country.

A beautiful, moving story of the unlikely and enduring friendship of two girls, one white and one black, who grew up together in the radically divided deep South.

At night, under the same roof, under the same moon, nothing divides the girls, Evie and Janey Louise. Talking on their beds, they discuss their strong mothers, their absent fathers, and they wonder about paths their lives will take. Yet during the day, Evie is blind to their differences-that she is white and her best friend is black. It is only as they grow older that Evie comes to see the inequalities that permeate their lives and to understand that for their friendship to continue she must recognize the different worlds they face.



From the Publisher
Praise for Night Talk: "Wise and touching...about love in all shapes and shades and forms." --Jill McKorkle "Elizabeth Cox never writes of a character whom she cannot literally inhabit. That beautiful property of her mind is visible in Night Talk." --Reynolds Price "Cox puts a human face on the struggle for equality in this thoughtful, well-written exploration of race relations in the South." --Raleigh News and Observer "Affecting, resonant...Reminiscent of To Kill a Mockingbird." --Library Journal "Cox...knows how friendships shift and change, grow cold and then rediscover warmth...An involving tale of two women's friendship in a world defined by race but illuminated by love." --Booklist

FROM THE PUBLISHER

At night, under the same roof, under the same moon, nothing divides the girls, Evie and Janey Louise. Talking in their beds they discuss their mothers, Agnes and Volusia; their absent fathers, one dead, one on the other side of the country; and their brothers, one fighting polio, the other fighting in the U.S. Army. Their closeness blinds Evie to the divisions of daylight - that she is white and her best friend is black; that it is her family's house they live in; that Janey's mother is the housekeeper for Evie's family. For years the inequities of race so permeate their lives that they remain invisible to Evie. It is only later in life that a startling series of events forces Evie to ask Jane for forgiveness. With elegance and compassion, Elizabeth Cox charts the course of two unlikely friendships, between two daughters and their remarkable mothers. Largely set against the backdrop of the Civil Rights days of the fifties and sixties, Night Talk also confronts the unexpected challenges of the present day. Throughout the novel, Cox exposes the insidious and persistent barriers that prevent us from being honest with each other.

FROM THE CRITICS

Publishers Weekly

The history of racial conflict during the 1950s is reenacted on a personal scale by two adolescent girls in this sincere but sometimes unconvincing reminder of turbulent times. In 1949, white research biologist August Bell leaves his family in Mercy, Ga., ostensibly to pursue his research on the Sea of Cortez. Volusia Davis, a black domestic, moves into the house with Bell's wife, Agnes, and children, accompanied by her daughter, Janey Louise. The friendship between Janey Louise and Agnes's daughter, Evie, is the focus of the story. Between the young girls' "night talks" in their shared bedroom and Evie's letters to August, the civil rights drama of the ensuing decade unfolds: Janey Louise's brother returns from Korea a militant; Janey Louise desegregates the high school and is raped by a white man. As adults, Evie and Janey Louise reunite for Volusia's funeral and struggle to overcome the ugliness of their mutual past. Despite a jarring murder late in the book (and an occasional disregard for the actual obstacles that kept middle-class black and white girls from forming close friendships under Jim Crow), Cox (The Ragged Way People Fall in Love) uses gracefully simple, affecting prose in a bittersweet portrayal of a tumultuous era. (Oct.)

School Library Journal

YAThe day Evie's father leaves home, Volusia, their maid, and Janey Louise, her daughter, move into the house. At first, both sleep in the room off the kitchen, but after a while Janey Louise moves into Evie's bedroom, and the night talk begins. In a small Georgia town in 1949, white and colored do not share a room, much less their secrets. But over the years, Volusia and Agnes, Evie's mother, become friends and business partners and Evie and Janey Louise share their feelings about boys, their worries about school, and their thoughts about their families. Evie's parents eventually divorce, and her younger brother struggles with polio. At first, the girls go to different schools, but Janey Louise and another student begin the 1956 school year by integrating the high school, accompanied by the press and the National Guard. Violent reprisals result, and the bond between the two girls is strained as their own fears and prejudices surface. The story of this enduring friendship spans a period of 40 years, and is told with humor, understanding, and compassion. YAs will be caught up in this tale of two young women struggling against the reality of black and white society in the civil rights era. Its lessons about love, friendship, and the cost of being different are unforgettable.Molly Connally, Kings Park Library, Fairfax County, VA

Kirkus Reviews

Friendship across the great racial divide of the South is sensitively addressed in a novel that tries too hard to make a moving tale profound.

Cox (Familiar Ground, 1984, etc.) here uses an awkward formula—letters to a father written in childhood mixed with alternating segments on the past and the immediate present—to tell the story of white Evie Bell and black Janey. The writing tends toward the awkward as well ("I missed his brows that could bring a soft rain") as Cox strains for meaning and effect. It all begins with the funeral in Mercy, Georgia, of Volusia, Janey's mother, who for 12 years had been not only Evie's mother's housekeeper but best friend. When August, Evie's biologist father, left for good, Volusia and Janey moved in and shared the family house. Janey was also soon sharing Evie's room—though no one in the town was supposed to know: It was the '50s, and while the struggle for civil rights was becoming more evident, the South was still rigidly segregated. At night, after the lights were out, the two girls loved to talk, and each day after school they played together. But as Evie, now a teacher in Texas, visits her mother and Volusia's grieving second husband, she recalls—seeing Janey again—how difficult it was to keep up that close rapport as the outside world intervened. When Janey was 16, her brother Albert, a decorated Korean War hero, was badly beaten for his civil rights activities, and Janey was raped—events that served to strain the girls' friendship badly. Now, the murder of a white man on the eve of Volusia's funeral, a murder that Janey is accused of before being exonerated, reveals hidden secrets and renews the old, essential ties.

An affecting celebration of the resilience of friendship, but undercut by its stock characters, who, despite nods to Faulkner and other southern greats, remain flat and unsurprising.