The painters of Lexieville. (Hardcover Fiction).

DARROW, Sharon. The painters of Lexieville. Candlewick Press. 182p. c2003. 0-7636-1437-8. $16.99.

JS*

This is Darrow's first novel for YAs, though she has written some children's books. It was inspired by her experiences when she was 17. working in an Arkansas County Welfare Office. The title is strange, especially for a YA novel, but it is from her memory of a father and son who took the job as painters on the county payroll, supervised by the Welfare Office, and how that job gave the men confidence. The family central to her novel is also changed dramatically by their painting jobs, but other conflicts, other relationships, provide the heightened drama of the story. The reader isn't really sure about these people introduced at the beginning of the story: Pert is still in school, looked down on as "trash" by most of her classmates; her brother Jobe has dropped out. Their mother Truly is frequently in bed; she is unusual--maybe not exactly insane, but definitely strange. Pert, Jobe. and Truly are the narrators of the unfolding crisis in their lives, which is caused by Truly's brother Orris, a drunken ne'er-do -well who abuses Pert. As the story of their lives comes together in the three narratives, the reader becomes a part of their family, of their world. By the time of the climactic event--Orris's attack on Pert, her struggle, and Jobe's murderous revenge--readers are horrified, but the story doesn't end there! Truly, in a confused effort to poison Orris, kills herself. Jobe, in his guilt, turns to the neighborhood church that handles deadly serpents. Fearing that she will also lose Jobe, Pert finds a way to save him.

Darrow seems to get it all right: the church services few of us could ever imagine; the family loyalty even if the families are fractured; the ambivalence of the young people about whether to leave their blighted lives behind or stay with the people and lives they know.