Leaving Cecil Street
A Novel
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4.7 • 10 Ratings
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- $6.99
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- $6.99
Publisher Description
A riveting tale about a back-room abortion that has devastating consequences for two teenage girls on a close knit Philadelphia block circa 1972
Block parties were king in this West Philadelphia neighborhood, especially the year Cecil Street decided to have two. These energetic, sensual street celebrations serve as backdrops to the story of best friends Neet and Shay and their families.
When Neet becomes pregnant by one of the corner boys, Shay arranges an abortion that goes terribly awry when Neet begins to hemorrhage. Neet is left unable to bear children and to Shay’s horror slips under the spell of her mother Alberta’s severe, esoteric religious beliefs. Shay is left to struggle with the grief of losing a cherished friendship, while she also bears witness to the the disintegration of her parents’ marriage. The story climaxes during the second block party, during which time it is discovered that Neet and Alberta have disappeared from Cecil Street—the holy-roller mother, Alberta, having finally been set free from the shackles of her church by none other than Shay’s father.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Wistful, melodious, contemplative, McKinney-Whetstone's prose feels inspired by the tenor sax central to this story. It's the summer of 1969 on Cecil Street in West Philadelphia, and "even though the block had long ago made the transition from white to colored to Negro to Black is Beautiful, the city still provided street cleaning twice a week in the summer when the children took to the outside and there was the familiar smack, smack of the double-Dutch rope." Neet and Shay, 17-year-old neighbors, are as close as that double rope, and when Neet's illegal abortion goes terribly wrong, Shay is distraught especially since the procedure had been her idea. Shay's father, Joe, offers tender, paternal wisdom: "Be sad 'cause your best friend is going through a trauma right now, that's a clean, honest sadness. Don't dirty it up with a bunch of guilt that you choosing to feel." Dealing with his own sadness and guilt is harder. Joe loves his wife, Louise, but giving up the sax soon after they married turned out to be a bigger sacrifice than he realized, and getting straight with himself is a moral, sexual, musical adventure. McKinney-Whetstone's fourth novel (after 1999's Blues Dancing) is remarkable for the rich development of all its characters, notably Neet's mother, Alberta. She first appears as a bleak woman who torments Neet with a cruel religiosity, but her backstory of forced prostitution reveals more about her; her final sacrifice redeems her. Meanwhile, Deucie, the mother who abandoned Alberta, has sneaked into Joe and Louise's cellar to die. Joe plays his sax, harmoniously connecting and resolving the separate story lines.
