The Mighty Miss Malone (review)

When Bud Caldwell (from Bud, Not Buddy, BCCB 11/99) had a brief stay in a Flint, Michigan Hooverville, the experience was doubly noteworthy: for the kindness of strangers, and for his first kiss. The instigator of that kiss was Deza Malone, an "older woman" of twelve who was waiting in the camp with her mother while her father looked for work. Deza takes the spotlight here, as Curtis creates a standalone backstory for the Malones, a family of four that is managing, just barely, to make it through the Depression until the double tragedies of the Joe Louis 1936 boxing defeat and Mr. Malone's boating accident on Lake Michigan leave Deza's father a broken man who takes off under the guise of job hunting. Deza, a whip-smart little paragon of self-styled "verbosity," her mother, and her undersized older brother Jimmie, lose their Gary, Indiana home and hit the road for Flint in search of Mr. Malone. As Deza struggles to piece together some sort of normal life between school and their Hooverville shack, their mother juggles part-time cleaning jobs, and Jimmie takes off to parlay his singing ability into nightclub work. Money begins to arrive at Flint general delivery, but Mr. Malone doesn't reappear to fulfill his promise to reunite the family, and it's up to Deza and her mother to unravel the dual mysteries of their benefactor and the father's whereabouts. The grinding burden of the working poor is handled even more poignantly and effectively here than in Bud, Not Buddy, as Deza and her family heartwrenchingly demonstrate how accustomed one becomes to hand-me-downs, welfare food, rotted teeth, and precarious employment. The ending, though, cautiously suggests a brighter future for the Malones (and perhaps a further title on Jimmie, should Curtis so deem), and readers will be relieved to see them "back on the road to Wonderful."