Spelling Mississippi

By Marnie Woodrow

Cleo Savoy, a Canadian, is in New Orleans on holiday. One evening she is sitting alone on the dock in the French Quarter, contemplating life, when a woman in an evening gown and a rhinestone tiara leaps over Cleo’s head and into the Mississippi River.

This is the beginning of Spelling Mississippi, a love story set in New Orleans. The novel is full of romance, drama, betrayal and sex. An interesting story but which, for me, lacked that extra intensity and magic.

After seeing the woman disappear into the mighty Mississippi Cleo is consumed with worry and soon the Mississippi swimmer becomes a deep obsession. Having just witnessed what Cleo believes to be a suicide, she spends the night distraught and alone in her hotel, the Pommes Royales, replaying the scene in her mind.

Madeline, the mystery swimmer, it turns out had not intended to commit suicide. She simply leapt into the river because she needed to. It was just the remedy for her anger and her pain, when everything in her life and in her marriage appeared to be falling apart.

Cleo, on the other hand, spends the rest of her holiday seeking answers to the mystery of the Mississippi swimmer, and searches through the streets of New Orleans for Madeline.

Throughout the novel each woman’s story unfolds. They both have maternal issues: Cleo copes with abandonment, Madeline with suffocation. Cleo’s mother disappeared when she was young whereas Madeline’s mother was always too present, trying to make up for Madeline’s father leaving, something that resulted in her pushing her daughter away.

Cleo and Madeline finally come together, just to discover that they have more in common than their troubled childhoods.