Rush Home Road

By Lori Lansens

'There were some days when there was no peace to be had and what you thought might happen didn't and what you never dreamed of did. Addy knew this would be one of those days. She shook a cigarette from her package and lit it while she wondered what to do.'

This is a beautifully written novel about a little girl who helps a grown woman find her way back home. It is a wonderful story about friendship and forgiveness.

The novel's main character is 70-year-old Adelaide 'Addy' Shadd, a woman of colour, who lives on the mud lane of the Lakeview trailer park. One summer she agrees to look after the 5-year-old mixed race girl Sharla Cody, thinking it will bring her much needed company. However, it seems like Sharla has come to stay when Sharla's mother, the trashy white woman Collette Depuis, empties her trailer and leaves Lakeview with her boyfriend in the middle of the night.

Addy lovingly looks after Sharla, who also reminds her of her own daughter, Chick. Sharla starts school and Addy helps her deal with a teacher who judges Sharla for being a product of an interracial relationship. On the other hand, Sharla brings back memories of Addy's past, which takes Addy down memory lane back to her childhood growing up in Rusholme, a small town where mostly coloured families had settled. She and her brother Leam were two very happy children, never fighting like other brothers and sisters. Life in Rusholme was very straight forward until the events of Strawberry Sunday. What happened that day forced 15-year-old Addy to leave her family home and the town she had grown up in.

However, the story ends warmly as she returns to her hometown of Rusholme. A town that provides a warm reception on her return.