About the Book
Book: Fences Left Broken
Author: Kristen Terrette
Genre: YA
Release Date: October 13, 2023
Mia’s father is dead, and her mother has left her in the rural Mississippi Delta town of Marigold with family she’s never known. Her two sets of grandparents are separated not only by a fence dividing their properties, but by skin color and a deep-seated hatred for each other which none of them will discuss.
When Mia learns their mutual hatred concerns a long-ago murder, she and her new friends set out to uncover who was murdered and why. Their search leads them to unspoken secrets and buried tragedies, stretching from the years of the Great Depression to the Freedom Summer Movement of ‘64.
Mia hopes to reconcile her grandparents by finding the truth. But can broken family fences be truly mended in the face of decades of unforgiving hate?
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About the Author
This landed her a job with Martin Literary Management where she now takes on author clients of her own. Stories are her thing and authors are her people. When not on her computer writing, editing, or emailing, or with her nose in a book, you can find her getting a little too loud from the sidelines of a kids’ basketball or football game. She’s also a recent transplant to rural Georgia where she thrives on jogging her forty acres terribly, drinking coffee while birdwatching, and daydreaming of new book characters, plotlines, and making her client’s dreams come true (which are her dreams as well).
More from Kristen
All you need is a spark.
When people find out I’m an author or have read one of my books, I’m often asked how I came up with the story. My answer is always the same. They all begin with a spark, a small idea, sometimes even taking root first in a remote corner of my mind, that says, “There’s a story there.” And that one spark lights, then it quadruples, over and over until it ends up a bright and thriving fire.
The spark for Fences Left Broken was a documentary from 2016 called Dirt & Deeds in Mississippi which told of “the largely unknown and pivotal role played (in the Freedom Sumer Movement and the Voting Rights Act) by black landowning families in the deep South who controlled over a million acres in the 1960s.” This documentary was fascinating and linked generations who had no idea just how important they would end up being in a much-needed and changing time in history. Black sharecroppers who benefitted from an agricultural program during Roosevelt’s New Deal became landowners overnight. Skip ahead a few decades, and these same landowners, or their heirs, had the power to force change.
In the sixties, Mississippi law said that if you were a landowner, you could vote, which opened doors for black families. But, also, these black landowners had leverage. Land was king. Land was also collateral. So when Freedom Summer came along and the wave of black Southerners tried to register to vote, these black landowners had a unique advantage.
Blacks and whites who were volunteering for the Freedom Summer Movement were arrested, often on bogus charges like disrupting the peace and put in jail. But guess what? Black landowners put their land titles up as collateral and got these people out on bond.
Even crazier, out of the hundreds of arrests and bail bonds issued that summer, not ONE failed to follow through and appear in court. Not ONE person charged with a bogus crime was found in default, their bail revoked, and the bond kept. This means not ONE black family who put their land up as collateral lost it.
Historians have gone so far as to say the success of Freedom Summer and the result of the Voting Rights Act wouldn’t have been possible without these families risking it all for the sake of justice and equality.
This documentary was my spark. I got to thinking about these families. They were real people, now generations of people, living in these intertwined communities. What would this have looked like through the years? What became of these families? Where are they now?
And the rabbit trail of my mind began. That spark ignited, and I followed it, outlining potential events that could have happened to families in Mississippi before and after the 1960s, and it all led to my main character, Mia. And Fences Left Broken was born.
I hope you enjoyed learning some little-known history, and a little tidbit of my writing inspiration. And I hope you are curious to find out more about Mia’s story!
Blog Stops
Tell Tale Book Reviews, March 8 (Author Interview)
For Him and My Family, March 8
Debbie’s Dusty Deliberations, March 9
Artistic Nobody, March 10 (Author Interview)
Texas Book-aholic, March 11
Gina Holder, Author and Blogger, March 12 (Author Interview)
Locks, Hooks and Books, March 13
A Reader’s Brain, March 14 (Author Interview)
The Lofty Pages, March 15
A Modern Day Fairy Tale, March 16 (Author Interview)
Blogging With Carol, March 17
Library Lady’s Kid Lit, March 18 (Author Interview)
Truth and Grace Homeschool Academy, March 19
Guild Master, March 20 (Author Interview)
Becca Hope: Book Obsessed, March 20
Fiction Book Lover, March 21 (Author Interview)
Giveaway
To celebrate her tour, Kristen is giving away the grand prize package of a $75 dollar Amazon gift card and a copy of the book!!
Be sure to comment on the blog stops for nine extra entries into the giveaway! Click the link below to enter.
https://promosimple.com/ps/2a553/fences-left-broken-celebration-tour-giveaway
My Review
I was instantly invested in Mia's story in Fences Left Broken. I wanted to keep reading to find out what secrets she would discover and see how grudges and hate can be passed down through generations. I found it to be a thought provoking and emotional novel. I loved how it had the ability to capture the lessons of forgiveness, love, hope and faith. It was a beautiful and inspirational story to read. I loved every single page from start to finish.
I am giving Fences Left Broken five stars. I highly recommend it for teen readers who enjoy reading clean and relatable young adult fiction. I would love to read more like this one by Kristen Terrette.
I received a paperback copy of Kristen Terrette's Fences Left Broken from the publisher, but was not required to write a positive review. This review is one hundred percent my own honest opinion.
