Baszile's debut novel follows Charley Bordelon, a young widowed former teacher in Los Angeles, who unexpectedly inherits eight hundred acres of sugarcane land in rural Louisiana from her father. She moves south with her eleven-year-old daughter Micah, into her grandmother Miss Honey's house, in time for planting — knowing nothing of cane farming, with neglected land, failing equipment, and too little money, in an industry her grandmother warns her will always be a white man's business. Her estranged, troubled half-brother Ralph Angel returns to contest the inheritance, while Charley finds wary allies, hired help, and an unexpected attraction. A San Francisco Chronicle Best Book of 2014, the novel was adapted by Ava DuVernay and Oprah Winfrey as the OWN television series Queen Sugar.
Author: Natalie Baszile · Original publisher: Pamela Dorman Books (New York), 2014
