Haynes, Melinda. Chalktown.

Simon & Schuster, Washington Square Press. 356p, c2001 0-7434-4250-4 $14.00. SA

In George County, Mississippi, Jesus holds a grudge like nobody's business, and loves a good joke, "same as everybody else." 16-year-old Hezekiah Sheehand tries to protect his five-year-old mentally retarded brother, Yellababy, from his mother, Susan-Blair. Seeking refuge from school and the dangerously careless Susan-Blair, Hezekiah takes Yellababy on an afternoon's walk to Chalktown. In Chalktown, the villagers haven't spoken in six years, and communicate by writing on chalkboards. Through multiple third-person narratives, the secrets of Chalktown and its inhabitants are revealed to us. Each character shows us his or her own secrets: love affairs, betrayals, murders, and impending death. A mysterious itinerant preacher weaves through the history of Chalktown and the Sheehand family. Though his miracles can be grotesquely warped--a birth is marred by bilirubin encephalopathy, a gift of literacy steals the power of speech--they are all, inevitably, about life or power. A sluggish spring day in rural Mississipi is well represented by the slow-paced dialogue and rumination. The individual character portraits reveal villainous actions, but no villainous people. Despite an air of Southern Gothic mystery, Hezekiah and his eccentric neighbors progress to a startlingly satisfying and hopeful conclusion. Deborah Kaplan, Arlington, MA