The Little Known

By Janice Daugharty

When twelve-year-old Knot Crews, an African American boy growing up in the segregated south Georgia town of Statenville, discovers a bag of bank-robbed cash in an alley, he is nearly overcome with happiness and terror. All that money--a hundred thousand dollars--could be the ticket to everything he's ever wanted, but he knows he can't spend it, not only because his conscience won't let him, but for fear of being caught. He decides to do what he can for his needy neighbors, both black and white, and begins mailing them hundred dollar bills anonymously, but it irks Knot daily to discover that most of them squander it and don't use the money as he had intended, and that the money doesn't change their lives for the better. It turns out that the weight of Knot's world can't be lifted by cold hard cash alone. Set during the turbulent 1960's, The Little Known is a coming-of-age story full of hope and forgiveness.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BelleBooks
• Release date: Feb 1, 2010
• ISBN: 9781935661559

Janice Daugharty

Janice Daugharty is Artist-in-Residence at Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College, in Tifton, Georgia. She is the author of one story collection and five novels: Dark of the Moon, Necessary Lies, Pawpaw Patch, Earl in the Yellow Shirt, and Whistle.

Book preview

The Little Known

A good-hearted boy.

A segregated town.

A stolen fortune.

When twelve-year-old Knot Crews, an African American boy growing up in the segregated south Georgia town of Statenville, discovers a bag of bank-robbed cash in an alley, he is nearly overcome with happiness and terror.  All that money—a hundred thousand dollars—could be the ticket to everything he’s ever wanted, but he knows he can’t spend it, not only because his conscience won’t let him, but for fear of being caught.

He decides to do what he can for his needy neighbors, both black and white, and begins mailing them hundred-dollar bills anonymously, but it irks Knot daily to discover that most of them squander it and don’t use the money as he had intended, and that the money doesn’t change their lives for the better.  It turns out that the weight of Knot’s world can’t be lifted by cold hard cash alone.

Set during the turbulent 1960’s, The Little Known is a coming-of-age story full of hope and forgiveness.

Praise for Janice Daugharty’s Writing

Daugharty does a fine job of demonstrating how ordinary men and women are affected, in unpredictable ways, by race, poverty and geography and by the enduring legacy of important historical moments.

—Francine Prose, People Magazine

Daugharty creates a forceful character and a compelling, often even humorous narrative.

—Washington Post Book World

Daugharty’s ear is excellent, her language concise and precise . . . shrewd and colorful prose.

—The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

 . . . fans will rejoice to see Daugharty do what she does best: showcase one character, setting her off against a thousand daily details, like a diamond nestled in the shards of lesser gems.

—USA Today

Swirling with details that become more disturbing the closer you look, Ms. Daugharty’s portrait of Cornerville is both intimate and unsettling.

—The New York Times Book Review

Janice Daugharty is a natural-born writer, one of those Georgia women like O’Connor, McCullers, or Siddons who are best grown in small towns, a long way from city lights. There is a lot of red clay and long nights in every line she puts on paper.

—Pat Conroy

The Little Known

by

Janice Daugharty

BelleBooks, Inc.

Copyright

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons (living or dead,) events or locations is entirely coincidental.

BelleBooks, Inc.

PO BOX 300921

Memphis, TN 38130

Ebook ISBN: 978-1-935661-55-9

Print ISBN: 978-0-9841258-5-2

Copyright © 2010 by Janice Daugharty

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.

We at BelleBooks enjoy hearing from readers. You can contact us at the address above or at [e-mail]

Visit our websites—BelleBooks.com and BellBridgeBooks.com

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2

Cover design: Debra Dixon

Interior design: Hank Smith

Photo credits:

Bicycle - ©Soubrette | iStockphoto.com

Sky - © Rolffimage | Dreamstime.com

Money - © Christopher Rawlins | Dreamstime.com

:Eltk:01:

Chapter 1

It is all happening so fast it feels slow, runny as the midday heat in the alley, and for a fact Knot can see the sun beaming down from the top of the world. A block of sky like bought ice in the shimmer stage of melting. Shimmery too, at the other end of the alley, is a giant with a warped booger-man face. He is hugging a brown paper sack and running Knot’s way, coming to rob him maybe of his play-cousin Lee’s bicycle. Knot starts panting like a dog to the strumming of haywire on the front wheel spokes.

No brakes on the bike and Knot has to drag his hurt foot over the hot cobblestones to stop, eyes on the man likewise stopping before the green dumpster midway up the alley between Patterson and Ashley streets. Shucking off what looks like one of Aunt Willie’s stockings from his head. Yes, a stocking. Black face, stung lips, teeth white as his eyes. Running again, the big man, big as Winston Riley, back home, makes straight for Knot but keeps close to the rear walls of the street-front stores.

Knot starts to drop the bicycle and run the other way, back toward Patterson Street where he had been cruising, cool and easy, but he can tell the man isn’t after him by the way he kind of slinks along the wall, slow now, cool and easy, with his left hand in the pocket of his brown jeans and his right arm encircling the stuffed brown paper sack with the top neatly folded. He looks scared, maybe afraid of Knot because Knot is so ugly—buck teeth, ball head, skinny as a tobacco-stick scarecrow.

Sudden sirens rage along Patterson Street, all around, like peepers before a rain, and the man loops around and heads back the way he came, running hard, and the paper sack slips from his arm and drops to the cobbled brick.

Hey, mister, says Knot, you drop yo sack. He just says it because he should say it, to be polite like his rich pretend-kin he’s been visiting all summer, but doesn’t yell it out and anyway the man knows and the man is turning the corner onto Ashley Street, gone, and Knot is glad he’s gone.

Still straddled the bicycle, Knot walks it over to the spot where the sack landed—top still folded down. The kind of sack Aunt Willie carries her groceries in from Harvey’s downtown all the way over to Troupe Street. Sirens shatter the time-ticking of haywire on the bike spokes. I ain’t into this, Knot mumbles, I ain’t into this. And Knot is pedaling fast up the alley, good foot bare and nail-jabbed foot in a white sock, then north along Ashley Street, past the stalled cars with horns beeping and shoppers dodging his bike. One block away from the screaming of sirens that makes his gums itch.

So hot, and he would like to be on the east side of town, where he longs to belong, in the shady quiet of row houses whose front yards spill children onto the gravel street. But at the next intersection, he steers the bicycle west, rather than east, and pedals along the sidewalk toward Patterson Street, where not ten minutes before, which seems more like a long fevered sleep, he had been minding his own business: cruising over spilled cola steeping on hot concrete and exploding pigeons the color of courtyard statues.

I ain’t into this, he says to a stout blue-haired woman weighted down with shopping bags. She is scurrying toward a parked car the color of her hair, trying to unlock it while gazing off across the street at the train of black and white police cars with lights flashing and sirens wailing. People are gathered around the door of the bank—FIRST NATIONAL BANK, according to the sign on the white stone facade atop the building at the corner of Patterson and Hill.

One more turn down the alley and Knot brakes with his socked foot, stopping next to the paper sack and scooping it up, packing it into the bicycle basket, then pedaling again, up the alley again, onto the sidewalk running parallel to Ashley Street, turning east this time and flying away from the sirens and car horns with pigeons the color of courtyard statues.

He should look, he should look in the sack, but he is afraid he will find money, afraid he will not find money. Looks like old magazines, the squared-off corners of the sack do. How do? he says to the brittle old black men seated on the store-front bench, corner of Troupe and Gordon. Hieing south, toward Aunt Willie’s house. He knows that the man in the alley was a bank robber, that what is in the sack has to be money. He doesn’t have to look, can’t wait to look. Instead he looks behind, pedaling regular and sure, south along Troupe Street, and his looking behind causes the bicycle to veer left where three black children are playing with a litter of black puppies. The happy kind, regardless of their station in life.

A tiny girl stands with a puppy hugged up to her bowed belly, hard tail switching at her stubby brown legs.

Go on, Knot, says her brother, an eight year old with square hair. This our dogs.

"What I want with no old dogs? Knot pedals straight up the street to prove he can drive this bicycle right. What I want with no old dogs?" he repeats to himself and laughs. Then cries. What he wants is to stay at Aunt Willie’s house.

He doesn’t really belong to Marge, so why can’t he belong to her sister?

An old auntie is sitting on one of the row house porches, fanning with a hand fan. Her stockings are rolled at her parted knees. High floors, up and down the street, so high that a boy can play underneath and hear the grownups walking around and talking inside—somebody older over him to protect him from the po-lice, mad dogs, and himself. Big square houses with peeling paint and metal gliders on spacey front porches where people sit in the sunshine after supper. Scraggly crepe myrtle trees with frilly cerise flowers that decorate the order of things that Knot can’t name. Just summer on Troupe Street.

Again he checks behind him, for the black and white cars downtown, stretching the distance between them and him and the street opening up ahead, and checks too for anybody who might happen to be listening—he has to keep talking to himself so that the words won’t bank in his overloaded head.

I ain’t ask for no money, don’t want no money. What business a lil ole knot like me got with money? All lies ticking off through his teeth to the tempo of the haywire on the wheel spokes.

He can see Marge’s celery and rust car parked in front of Aunt Willie’s roomy old house, waiting to take him back to the one-room shack in the quarters of Statenville, twenty-five miles east of Valdosta. That’s where Marge has to live till she gets cured of drinking and cussing. All of Knot’s rich pretend-kin are on the front porch: Aunt Willie sitting in one of the high-back rockers, taking the hem on Cousin Judy Beth’s white baptism dress; the old granddaddy in the next rocker with his puffed pinkish lips and white hair; Lee on the end of the porch, watching for Knot and his bicycle around the twine trellis of nooning purple morning glory. Marge, rawboned and tall, is standing on a baluster of the doorsteps in her walked-down black shoes and the black-and-navy striped dress that looks all-black, which she always wears to town. Won’t wear color, Marge won’t. The women are laughing, hooting, and Aunt Willie play-spanks the seat of Judy Beth’s flare-tailed dress. She scoots forward with her bony shoulders slumped and arms limp alongside, play-mad, and stomps through the front screen door, slamming it.

Knot swerves the bike onto the sloped dirt drive, north of the house, and coasts on toward the back yard.

What you got in the basket? calls Lee.

Books, says Knot, passing the chimney with mortar sifting like hour-glass sand from between the red bricks. Bunch of old books.

Say books, Knot has found out, and nobody will look inside a box or bag.

That boy do love his books, says Marge and hums a laugh. She tells everybody that, and though she doesn’t read herself, she is proud he does read, proud of this lil ole knot, as she calls him, who she had taken to raise after somebody fished him out of the trash twelve years ago. Get yo stuff, Knot, she yells, we gotta go.

Knot step on a nail yesterday, stick it in his foot, says Lee, who figures Marge might care for a change.

Knot is in the back yard, at the sloped edge of the porch, standing straddled the bicycle. The uneven boards of the hip-roofed house used to be painted either green or red; you can’t tell which because the paint is scaling, blending, and the effect is a rich tapestry. The fact that Knot is long-gone, hiding out from the po-lice with his stolen money, makes no difference to his family out front. They are still mouthing at him as if he is right there with them. Get Aunt Willie and Marge together and they’ll talk.

What all them sireens about? calls Aunt Willie.

"Ain’t seen no sireens." Knot wipes his eyes on the sleeves of his brown striped shirt, then lifts the paper sack from the basket and lets the bicycle drop on its side. Wheels spinning and haywire clicking on the spokes.

Up the tall wood doorsteps, past the daisywheel of yellow cats eating oatmeal from a bowl and through the door to the sunny yellow kitchen. Toasted bread smells—one more thing Knot loves about city living, about being at his rich pretend-kin’s house. Money buys the smell of toast and money buys color. He will buy Marge a toaster and some color for her shack.

He is still holding the sack of money, or maybe books—now that he has said it he wonders and wouldn’t be surprised or even disappointed if it were books. He stands on the curb next to the old car that reeks of mildew and burnt motor oil. Aunt Willie and Marge are loading paper sacks of Lee’s hand-me-down clothes into the trunk.

Be enough clothes to start him back to school, says Aunt Willie and rubs his head hard. Like Daddy always say, Marge, put a brick on that head if he keep growing.

Mourning doves purl, locusts hum. Way-off rumble and toot of a freight train Knot has seen with his own two eyes. The three black children with the black puppies linger along the street. A slow car passes. Their mother steps to the edge of her wide front porch with her hands on her hips. Git off that hardroad fore a car run over you.

You gone nuss them books all the way home, or put em back here? Marge asks Knot. She has one hand on the raised trunk with a long brown finger hooked through her key ring. Bunch of keys. Though only one serves a purpose. She slams the trunk, hugs and hums over Aunt Willie, Granddaddy and Judy Beth, then goes around to her side of the car.

Kiss em all bye, Knot, she says.

He hugs the books and kisses Aunt Willie and Judy Beth on the cheeks as they pass along the curb before him. You behave yourself, says Aunt Willie.

I’m gone miss yo ugly mug, says Judy Beth.

That boy be a fool bout them books, hums Marge over the car roof.

Knot is truly ugly, and he likes Judy Beth—maybe loves her—because unlike everybody else she never pretends that he’s easy to look at.

The old granddaddy pokes over with his cane and slaps Knot on the shoulder. He wears a suit of gray twill work clothes, starched and ironed. His skin is the gray of his clothes. You be back here fore you know it. Mind Marge, you hear?

Yessir. Knot likes him too—no, loves him—wishes he were his real granddaddy.

Lee is inside, outside, somewhere. The fact that he doesn’t come to say good-bye says how sorry he is to see Knot go. All summer they have quarreled over the bicycle, drove Aunt Willie crazy, but now that Knot is leaving, Lee is sorry to see him go. May be crying right this very minute. Knot grins, shining his great white teeth.

Knot is almost safe, almost free, perched on the front seat with only his eyes moving. But Marge has to run by the drugstore downtown to get her blood pressure medicine. Knot cannot believe that he is downtown again, traveling along Patterson Street again. Light traffic slow-motoring along all four lanes of the one-way street and not a cop in sight.

It has to be books in the sack. Old magazines, probably.

Marge is changing lanes, merging left, turning the celery and rust car onto West Hill, pulling up and backing into the corner parking space with the bank on the northwest corner behind them.

You coming in with me? she says. Too hot out here in the car.

I’ll just sit here.

You ain’t sick? She feels his forehead with the backside of her hand. You just sad, she says. Hating to leave everybody, right?

Right.

Cause they rich, right? She hums a laugh because she doubts that. Well, read you one of them books while I’m gone. She opens the door, checks for traffic, lumbers out and around the rear of the car.

He watches her pass through the glass side door of Bel-Lile Drugs next to the stairs that lead up to the doctor’s office where Marge took Knot when he had what’s called coronals on his neck, and where there were two waiting rooms—one for blacks and one for whites. Long time ago, and now he goes to school with the whites who treat him okay because he is clean and honest, makes good grades, and never says po-lice, sireen, loot or cop.

Now he can look in the sack; he has to look. Is afraid to look.

He stays stiff, unblinking, as he unfolds the brown paper cuff, peeps inside. He looks up and blows. Ain’t books, he says, biting back a grin.

Stacks of dirty-green hundred-dollar bills with narrow bands like brown paper-sacking marked 1000 in red print.

He blows at his forehead again. Folds the top of the sack down, grips it tighter. Stares straight ahead. He wonders how much money he has. Starts to get out and leave the sack with the loot on the doctor’s stairs. Waves of high tight happiness and terror pass over him like hot and cold water.

Suddenly, the driver’s door swings wide, and Marge is getting into the car with a white cup of fountain soda in one hand and a white sack of rattley pills in the other. Here, she says and hands him the cup. Perk you up.

Thank you, he says.

Say somebody rob the bank this afternoon, get 25,000 dollar.

He is sipping the fizzy cold cola and has to bite down on the cup lip to keep from gurking. Sinks his buck teeth into the Styrofoam leaving horseshoe impressions he can see with the tip of his tongue.

Almost out of town, juddering south past the ABC Liquor Store on his right and checking Marge’s long brown hands on the steering wheel to see if they will turn the wheel right. Then over the railroad overpass, from which point he can almost see Aunt Willie’s fine house and can see her church with the fancy white steeple and cross. He will buy a house like that, he might even buy a church like that, but knows he probably never will—even with all this money—when Marge stops at the Dixie Station and has to count out her dollars and dimes for gas and he cannot so much as hand her one of the hundred-dollar bills from the sack for fear of getting caught.

Knot dozes with his left hand on the paper sack of worthless money between his cot and the unpainted wall and window of Marge’s shack in the quarters. It’s too hot to sleep.

But Marge, in the next bed, is snoring—sounds like a small engine sputtering—and next door, in the shack on the right, Winston Riley is beating up his wife Boots. Children scream, flesh splats, a chair overturns, Boots hollers, No, Winston, no! In a minute, she will be over here. In a minute, Marge will be doctoring her battered head while preaching to her about leaving Winston.

A door slams. Knot sits up, swings his feet over the edge of the cot and waits for Boots, waits for the heat to let up. Dim light through the screened window facing the woods—starlight thick with the ringing of katydids and the hulled whine of mosquitoes. Rooty smell of hogs in the pen out back, or maybe it’s the rotting potatoes in the bag by the front door. Ask Marge why she doesn’t clean up the combination kitchen-living room-bedroom and she’ll tell you quick that she gets enough of cleaning other people’s houses. Besides, she adds, my own dirt, me and mine, don’t bother me. Knot feels good when she says the part about me and mine, because then and only then does he feel he belongs. She’s never even hugged him. But she has let him borrow her last name—Crews—same name as the old gray granddaddy.

Knot slaps a mosquito on his arm and scratches the itch till it smarts. Marge has quit snoring, is waiting too.

Feet bound on the porch floor, shaking the entire shack and rattling the windows. Bap bap bap on the door. Ragged breathing, mewling. A baby stifles crying.

Marge moans, stands, pulls the cord on the overhead light. White light showers down on her broomed peroxide hair. She is almost forty, but looks younger because she is skinny, all legs in her man’s white T-shirt (Knot cannot remember which man, only that once upon a time there was a man), except for her belly, which is bloated and tight from what the doctor calls liver trouble.

Long bare feet in motion, Marge lumbers over to the front left corner and picks up her old rabbit-eared shotgun, then goes to the vertical-board door and flips the metal latch. Boots with her antennae braids and wild eyes, and a baby on one hip, shoves past Marge and into the room. Three guinea children are clinging to her legs. Boots’s nose is leaking blood to her blue cotton smock trimmed in red rickrack; her broad flat nose looks flatter, spattered.

Rotten potatoes scatter and roll across the filthy wide floorboards and out the door where Marge is standing with her shotgun pointed barrel-up to the night sky. She breeches the shotgun and fires. A flashette of orange, the color of her hair, then smoke curling back into the room with Marge. Come on over here, Winston, she yells in her braying night voice. I’m waiting on you. Much cussing. Then quiet outside as she slams the door and sets the latch in its hook.

Inside, the children are sniffling, whining, drying up their crying. And Boots has one forearm pressed over her nose, blood leaking over and around it and drip drip dripping on the floorboards.

Marge ambles over to the corner and leans the shotgun against the unceiled wall, then picks up a white washrag

Reviews for The Little Known

[mountie9_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A beautiful written moral tale set in the south during the turbulent 60's. A young black boy, Knot, discovers a bag full of stolen cash from a botched bank robbery. Since he cannot use the money himself due to moral and practical reasons, he decides to share small amounts with his needy neighbors, both black and white. Most of the neighbors don't use it wisely and Knot learns that the money doesn't help them change their lives for the better.Janice is a wonderful storyteller who writes of characters and landscapes that leap from the page and make you feel that you are right there with them in the story. The story deals with Social Issues, forgiveness, racism and poverty. A very Human story with authentic people that showcases the good and evil in all of us.It is touching, gripping, tragic, and yet somehow hopeful.Now that being said I want you to know it wasn't my sort of thing. I found it slow at times and too overly descriptive for my taste. However, it is an outstandingly beautiful story and most will enjoy it. I think it would be a fantastic addition to a public schools English curriculum. It would bring up thousands of moral discussions and many teachable moments. Also the copy that I was given was an ebook, and I find them extremely challenging to really get into. The ebooks I find have a less personal feeling to them and I often lose my place and feel disjointed from the story. I think this particular story would be better suited to an actual physical book which would help you to become more emotionally invested in the story.

[joyceclark · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Touching story, endearing main character. I liked the story from the first few pages. Very difficult to read in the e-book format, though (but I received it before I got a Kindle - maybe it would have been easier to read in that format!)

[madamediotte · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Although I found it difficult to be captivated, especially at the beginning, Knot really started to grow on me and I am glad I stuck to it and read it all. His growth and his character in general is quite endearing and although this was far from what I expected, I liked it. It makes for a different angle of the whole 'You can't buy happiness' idea.

[kittycrochettwo · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Knot Crews is a thirteen year old African American boy growing up in Statensville Georgia. who was told most of his young life that he was fished out of a dumpster and taken to raise by Marge, she struggles with alcoholism, and alot of days there isn't enough food to eat. They live in what I would call a shanty town, and everybody seems to be poor. The one bright spot is the summers spent with his "Aunt Willie"Marge's sister whom he hopes that some day they will move in with. During the last days of summer, he sees a commotion at the bank, and sees a tall black man drop a bag in the alley. When he goes to retrieve the bag, he finds that it has stacks and stacks of one hundred dollar bills, one hundred thousand dollars to be exact. Knot knows that there is no way that he can spend the money, he will be caught for sure, but he comes up with a plan to help his neighbors, but instead of the neighbors using it to purchase food or other needed items they waste the money. He also donates 100 dollar bills regularly to his church, a place where he is certain to always get a meal. Even though Knot doesn't spend one dime of the money on himself, it does allow him to see the effects it has on other people around him. This book isn't my usual style of read, but I am so glad that I gave it a chance. The protagonist in the story doesn't let life's adversities get him down. While he describes himself as ugly early on in the book, I would totally disagree. His kind caring nature really shines thru and his actions showcase his inner beauty which far outweighs anything that he could consider ugly. I felt like Knot was wise beyond his years, and while he knows that keeping and spending the money isn't right, he wants to make peoples lives a bit easier. When Knot finally learns the truth about who his birth mother is, and that he really is part of the family that he wanted to belong to I hoped that things might take a turn for the better for him. I found the look at race relations set during this time period quite interesting as well, and while it was quite easy to figure out who the "special" speaker would be at Willie's church, it seemed very fitting for the story.This book for me was one that I couldn't put down, reading it in one sitting. I have never read anything by Janice Daugharty before reading this story, but fully intend to check out some of her other work. While this book is geared toward teens, I think readers of all ages will find Knot's story a compelling tale that will definitely tug at your heartstrings.

[btwnthecovers · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I think I will really like this book but the e version was difficult to read and navigate. I had a very hard time starting the book and even more finishing it. I liked the premise, the characters, the plot and the storyline but I probably won't request an ebook via the Thing again. I'll update my review when I get either a paper version or the book on my iPad.

[peleluna · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

An interesting premise, but it was difficult to engage in this book. Not sure if it was the pdf format, or the setting and premise(e.g., southern town, turbulent era, coming of age, etc.). While the protagonist was endearing, I found it hard to engage with the rest of the characters and the plot, which is simply the old adage of "money can't buy happiness." Perhaps it might be better experienced in actual book format. For now, the characterization of Knot is what keeps this book from two stars.

[novelbookworm_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Knot Crew, a twelve-year-old African American boy in a small South Georgia town, finds a bag of cash dropped by a bank robber in an alley. Alternating between fear and joy, Knot takes the cash home. He knows he can’t spend it; Knot is a good boy with a strong moral compass and he’s smart enough to know that if he’s caught with it, he’ll be in real trouble. After a great deal of thought, he decides to use the money to try to help his poor neighbors and he starts anonymously mailing them hundred dollar bills. Knot is surprised and disappointed to watch as his neighbors squander the cash, and his dreams of helping them achieve a better quality of life are broken. Knot discovers that problems aren’t solved by money alone.The Little Known by Janice Daugharty is a coming of age story from a turbulent era. Set in the 1960’s in the segregated south, and highlighting the poverty and hardships faced by many. The author’s characterizations are strong and it’s impossible to not love the protagonist, Knot. He’s a fine boy, in spite of his upbringing, with a huge kind heart. Unfortunately, he’s surrounded by such unlikeable characters, that I just wanted him to get the heck out of there and abandon the lot of them. Knot’s mother is almost irredeemable, and it’s heartbreaking to see Knot battle so hard to help her. I think my problem with the book came from my own experiences. I lived for 30 years in an area that was relatively poor, with a population that received an influx of cash a couple of times a year from the government, along with other assistance. So I knew that money won’t solve the problems of drug abuse, alcoholism, chronic unemployment, spousal and child abuse and all the issues showcased in the novel. I found myself wanting to reach into the book and try to explain to Knot that his optimism, while lovely and kind, was seriously misplaced. It was hard to watch Knot come to the understanding that you can’t help people who don’t want to help themselves. Would I recommend The Little Known? Ehh…I was mostly just glad when I finished it. It’s wasn’t bad, just a little depressing.

[allejean · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I read the e-book review copy of this book on my Kindle. The formatting was a bit off (as usually happens when you put a PDF on a Kindle), but I have read several books this way and don't have a problem reading through the odd paragraph break.I had a hard time getting into the flow of this book, which initially made me question my read of it. The plot and characters were interesting and I know the writer won a Pulitzer, so it was nice to read that other reviewers had the same problem. The book did pick up pace halfway through, and I read the second half much quicker than the first. I would like to read other novels by Janice Daugharty, but I'm not going to recommend this one to friends and family.

[readingrat_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

At first I didn't realize this was going to be an ebook so I was waiting for it to arrive in the mail. I've been reading it for a while now (now that I've found it). I'm enjoying both the writing and the premise.

[tanisha364 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I had a difficult time finishing this book. I normally tend to be one of those crazed readers that has to finish a book in one setting, but I definitely couldn't do it with this book. I'm not sure if it was due to being an e-book or the fact that it moved so slowly. All I know is that it seemed painful for me to read. I finished several other books while reading this one. It just didn't keep my attention. I think I will buy a Daugharty book and give her another try to determine if the format of the book or the writing style was the problem for me.

[luna68_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Overall I enjoyed this book, though the pacing was varied. I think that the themes and lessons in the book aimed at older children are very insightful and timely. Some of the historical references may go over the head of kids today - there was a reference to Martin Luther King, Jr. giving a speech at a church that Knot, the main character, attended, and this was a turning point in his life. However, Dr. King was never referenced by name, and the real significance of what he was teaching was also not really addressed directly. I think more could have been done with this part of the story. It was an interesting and captivating book anyway.

[bohemiangirl35 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Whoops! I wrote a review, but put it in the wrong place. This is only the second e-book I've tried to read and I definitely prefer to hold a bound copy in my hand. That said, I just could not get into this book! The story is drawn out, the dialect is just a little too much, and where did poor Knot learn to be so selfless? Certainly not from Marge or any of his "rich pretend-kin." I've tried several times, but this is one book I just don't think I will read to the end.

[bacreads · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I received this to review but because it was an ebook it took me a bit to read. I really liked this short story, perhaps because I have recently finished The Help and this seemed to dovetail with that story. Knot, or David learned much about himself and his situation while trying to distribute money he found from a bank robbery. I think Ms Daugharty told the stoty in a strong, believable narrative. It was humerous at times but also a reminder of the difficult and tragic times in the South. David learned that the color of a person's skin did not mean that he always had to be subservient. A black man could be educated and have dreams which allowed David to understand that his future need not be hopeless. I would recommend this and will be interested in the author's impending novel of the South.

[xaverie_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

The Little Known by Janice Daugharty was the first e-book I won from the Early Review program and I was initially excited about that. My excitement quickly faded as I waded into the book.Right off the bat the author hit on two of my literary pet peeves: overdone dialects and useless sentence fragments. Often there would just be a few words, dropped in out of nowhere, not explaining anything. These instances felt like full-stops to the chugging train of reading, pulling me out of the story and wondering exactly what the point was.The story seems to drag on much longer than it should, with almost everyone except Knot coming across as an over the top caricature. Which is understandable since the story is told from the perspective of a child sometimes adult personalities can be overwhelming.I was under the impression that this was intended to be a novel for older children though not quite at the young adult level but it seems as if the author is trying to channel authors with much more artistic nuance than herself rather than spin a tale that will be interesting to young and old alike. I liked the premise much better than the actual execution of the story.

[joylene-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is not a book I would have taken off the shelf to read - BUT I am so glad I chose it to review - While I had some difficulty entering into the story I did find that as the story progressed I found it more and more difficult to put down. The story then progresses along at a decent pace and with good messages to the reader.

[jasbro-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is a very well-written story about the trials of a young boy in a changing world. It has a nice, even contrast of meaningful bits and humor. So much time and detail went into perfecting this work of literature. I have to admit, starting out; I did not have high hopes for this book. However, as the story progressed, I found myself loving these characters and the challenges placed in front of them. This book was well-researched and seemed to actually melt into the time period. In the end, I was pleasantly surprised and wishing that there was more to this story. (PSB, age 13)

[pb_29_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Like many others, I initially struggled to get into this book, because of the e-book format, but am so glad I persevered! Set in Southern America, The Little Known tells the story of Knot, a young boy who becomes the unlikely owner of a sack full of money stolen from a bank. Knowing that he cannot use the money himself, Knot starts to send hundred dollar bills to people in his poverty-stricken neighbourhood, and this story charts the effects of this. The story is quite dark at times, and touches on serious issues such as domestic violence and alcoholism, as well as dealing with the everyday challenges arising in childhood. The narrative style used by Janice Daugharty was very easy to follow, and language and descriptives added a depth of reality to the characters and situations. Overall, though different from my usual reads, I thought this was a good book, and would recommend it to others.

[catscritch · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I received this as an e-book and had no problems reading it. As a matter of fact, I thoroughly enjoyed reading it. I felt privy to a lifestyle and thoughts I could never have experienced on my own. At least, not from that side of the highway. I found the protagonist compelling, 3-dimensional and humanly full of growing pains and morality conflicts. This is not a world I would want to live, but I feel I am a better person for having read about it. Janice Daugharty keeps the pace moving and never gives away the next turn before you flip the page. Job well done!

[literaryfeline · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

The Little Known is the story of a nine-year-old African American boy named Knot in 1960's segregated Georgia. While out riding his cousin's bicycle, he comes across a bag of money, dropped by a bank robber who was fleeing from the police. Knot could have easily spent some of the money on that bicycle he's been wanting, but he knows he'd have to explain himself. Instead, he decides to give the money away, hoping to make life better for those around him. Only, it does not quite work out that way.Knot is a sweetheart of a boy who is coming into his own. He seems so innocent at times and yet like an older soul at others. He has been poor all his life and believes that money can make things better. He quickly learns, however, that having money does not correlate with people doing the right thing. Knot is also struggling with his identity, trying to figure out his place in the world--and in his family.The author captures the essence of a poverty stricken, close-knit community, full of internal strife and yet coming together in times of need. Knot lives with Marge, a woman whose weakness is alcohol. I didn't much like her at first, but the more I got to know her, the sorrier I felt for her and the more I hoped she would pull herself together for Knot's sake. She really wasn't a bad person, just a damaged one. Many of the characters in the novel are damaged in some way, white and black alike. Among them are the family next door with the drunk abusive husband; the daughter whose mother is mentally ill and often runs naked in the neighborhood; and a girl who is handicapped but whose family can't afford a wheelchair. I wouldn't have minded if some of these other characters had been more fleshed out, however. Then again, this is Knot's story more than anyone else's.And although the author did not go into it as much as I would have liked, I was especially drawn to Knot's relationship with Becky Bruce, the white girl and the daughter of Sammy Bruce, a man who terrorizes not only those in the black community but his own family as well. Becky is a sad child, withdrawn and easy to tears. While Knot tries to dismiss her at first, he can't help but feel the need to help her, somehow rescue her from her father. He is fearful though; the colors of their skin make friendship dangerous.While Knot is my favorite character in the novel, coming in at a close second is the pastor. Knot admits that he likes to go to church every Sunday for the food. Sometimes it's the only good meal he'll get that week. The pastor plays the role of the father figure and is perhaps the one stable person in Knot's life.Race does play a part in the novel. There is always an undercurrent of tension in that regard. Knot is one of a handful of black students in a school that has recently been integrated. And in the society at large, there is a clear demarcation of who holds the power: the white man. As the story unfolds, however, there is definite hope that change is coming.Overall, this was a touching novel of forgiveness and hope. On the surface, it is a simple story, but it has several layers, some of which I'm still discovering after having finished it. This is a novel I think both adults and children would enjoy.Just a note of warning: the author does use the "n" word in the text, albeit minimally. Given the time period the novel is set in, it was not out of place.

[amandacb_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

While I like the premise of the book, it has slight echoes of Elijah of Buxton by Christopher Paul Curtis—which I just recently read. Here are the positives: The author uses some great metaphors and some vibrant details (“cerise flowers” especially sticks out since I had to look up “cerise”). The idea of a young boy as a protagonist is interesting, especially one who is as selfless as Knot is.My issues with this book are its predictability—we all could see that people would squander the money—and its style. I understand the author was trying to mimic the boy’s own personal style, but the intrusive dialect got in the way of comprehension. For a seamless blending of high and low style, consult Zora Neale Hurston. She integrated the dialect without losing any literary quality. While the idea of Knot being so selfless is intriguing, it saddens me to say I don’t think it’s very believable. In my experience, such selflessness doesn’t come until much older (we’re talking thirties, forties), if ever.(Note: received the e-book through Early Reviewers)

[buttsy1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

While I enjoyed the plot line, and was interested enough throughout the story, I found 'The Little Known' a difficult read.This may have been due to situation and language - it was about as foreign to me as the Glaswegian tone of Irvine Welsh's books.There were one or two plot devices I had trouble accepting. Knot sending off the money through the mail, for example. Would none of the recipients have realised that it was addressed in the handwriting of a child? To be honest, I never really understood the Marge/Knot thing either. I know he was her son, but what was all the mystery about?I received this through the Early Reviewers program, and if nothing else I am pleased to have read it, as the book has opened my eyes to another culture in another time. I suppose the closest anything else I have read for this setting would be 'To Kill a Mockingbird', or 'Mississippi Burning' - both very different in plot to 'The Little Known', but set in the deep south of the USA.

[tessaslingerland · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

It took me a while to get into this story. Actually, I had read more than half the pages before it really gripped me. Then I finished the rest in one go.This is a story about a poor black boy who finds a sack full of money from a bank robbery. He decides to take the money and give it to people who really need it. But things don't go the way he plans them. He gives 100 dollars to his mother so she can buy him a new bike, but she spends it all on alcohol. He gives 100 dollars to his neighbors to buy a wheelchair for their daughter, but they spend it on a bike for their son. Slowly but surely he finds out that having money does not make you a happy person. That even the rich white girl from his class has problems, much bigger ones than he has himself. And that all his big dreams (living with his family, owning a bike) aren't really that important.

[golux1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Living with his Aunt Marge in the poorest quarter of a small Georgia town, Knot longs for a family of his own, a comfortable home with regular meals, and a bicycle. Poverty becomes the least of his worries when he finds a sack of money, dropped in the course of a bank robbery. But stolen money is difficult to spend and Knot resolves to give it away, anonymously, to the people who need it most -- the poorest people of his neighborhood. Despite his best efforts, the effects of the sudden windfall on the little community are mixed, at best -- donations to Marge only increase her ability to drink, another boy gets a bicycle with money intended for his disabled sister, but good things come too -- abused wives have the choice to leave, although they don't always take it, the energetic young preacher builds a basketball court and teaches Knot to play. In the course of a year, Knot gains the family he wants and a new name, but not in the way he expected. New ideas are astir in the small community, the Civil Rights Movement, referred to as "the Cause",the possibility of education through the newly desegregated school, and new models for manhood in the young preacher -- all of these feed Knot's hunger for a larger life. When Knot stands up to a white man, and survives, he has no further need of the money.The language of this book is beautiful and evocative, involving all the senses on every page. Fire "crackles and purrs as if filled with milk-fed kittens", a young girl blows bubbles on which "hatch marks of rose sun" shimmer and we can smell the asphalt of the roads, the woodsmoke from the quarter's fires, the damp vegetation of the roadsides. The life it evokes, of poverty and simmering racial tension is not for the faint-hearted, but strength and love are found in improbable places and Knot's journey to manhood seems to shimmer with possibility.

[gaijinsue_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I've been a fan of Janice Daugharty since her debut short story collection Going Through the Change. Daugharty's voice, one of the most distinctive in contemporary American literature, is dense and rich - one might want to take a fork to it. In this novel, Knot, a poor 12-year-old African-American boy living with his often-drunk mother in the segregated South, comes across a sack of money dropped by a bank robber. He begins to secretly dole it out to his impoverished neighbors,with less than satisfying results. Although the setting is potentially bleak, Daugharty lightens it up with flashes of humor.

[annekiwi · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I liked this book. I really enjoyed the premise of a boy with so little giving to others hoping to help them improve their lives. His frustration at their folly in how they spend the money was written very well. I thought there were areas of the book that could use more fleshing out, that the surface was touched and I wanted to see what was underneath. All in all, a quick and enjoyable read.

[sylviawrigley · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

The Little Known by Janice Daugharty is dark and gritty book about a boy called Knot growing up in the rural south and trying to make sense of the adults and their odd ways. The story takes place in the 1960s, with a brief appearance by Martin Luther King and references to The Cause but Knot's world is still full of the Haves and Havenots - specifically the white and black populations of the small town in Georgia where he lives with his alcoholic mother. The plot device is clever: Knot finds a bag full of hundred-dollar bills which he can't spend so he tries to anonymously give them away, only to end up unhappy with the results. It is easy to associate with and feel sorry for the boy. The description is very carefully crafted, each sentence a gem, but I felt the effect in the narrative was somewhat overwhelming. The constant barrage of detail sometimes made me feel that I was wading through molasses to find the action. As a result, I was somewhat surprised to see this book referenced as Young Adult - I suspect there is too much thinking and not enough doing for most boys in that age group. I was uncomfortable with some of the stereotypes: the alcoholic mother with a heart of gold, the black preacher who manages to charm the local teenagers to play basketball rather than court trouble, the white boss-man who not only hits his wife but has no redeeming feature whatsoever. I guess such portrayals can be easier for young readers to grasp, leaving Daugharty free to focus on Knot's discoveries about the adult world in general. However, I can't imagine recommending the book to friends and family.

[samsattler · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

"The Little Known," a coming of age novel set in the period just after the assassination of President John Kennedy, was written for the young adult market but there is something here for readers of all ages. On the one hand, the novel’s deeply personal portrayal of the harsh nature of race relations of the time is sure to move younger readers who may have only heard about those days in more general terms. On the other, older readers will be reminded that a great deal of progress has been achieved in the last 50 years.Things are changing very slowly for the black citizens of little Statenville, Georgia. “Knot” Crews does go to school with white kids now, but he seldom, if ever, dares to speak to one of them, and he lives with his hard-drinking mother in the same segregated part of town in which every Statenville black lives. Blacks and whites do not, by choice of both sides, mix in Statenville.Near the end of the summer, Knot happens upon a bag of cash tossed aside by a bank robber who is trying to escape the policemen closing in on him. When Knot sees the stacks of $100-dollar bills in the sack ($100,000 worth), he carries the money home knowing full well that his conscious will never allow him to spend it - that he will almost certainly be caught if he ever tries to pass one of the hundreds. Little does Knot know, however, that this money will change his life in ways he could never imagine.Knot is a soft hearted kid despite the fact that his mother spends more money on booze for herself than she spends on food for him. He is often hungry, and he dresses in the castoff clothing of older relatives, but so does pretty much every other kid in his neighborhood so Knot fits right in. He looks forward to Sunday church services because the old church ladies provide him with a community meal there that beats anything else he will eat during the rest of the week. Some of Knot’s neighbors, though, are unluckier than others, and he decides to use some of his found money to make their lives a little easier. That is when he begins to anonymously mail single hundred dollar bills to those he believes are hurting most.Thus begin Knot’s valuable, but terribly disappointing, lessons about human nature. Seldom is his money spent for the purpose he gives it. Most of the money he gives away is spent on new television sets, bicycles, toys and liquor rather than on the clothing, food, diapers and home improvements his neighbors so desperately need. Knot is, however, happy to learn that a few hundred dollars can be enough money to give some abused women, white and black alike, the courage to leave their husbands behind for fresh starts with their children someplace else."The Little Known" follows Knot and his neighbors for most of a school year during which the little changes he initiates begin to have a big, cumulative impact on the neighborhood. He learns that money is not the most important thing in the world, that it cannot buy happiness or morality, and that the exact opposite is more often the case than not. Knot might never spend a dime of the bank’s money on himself but the money still manages to teach him most of life’s most important lessons.Some of the sexual innuendos and implied language in the book are, I think, a little too much for middle school readers, making the book more suitable for high school age readers.Rated at: 4.0

[mminor1985 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This book is set in the South in the sixties where the main character, Knot is an African American youth who finds a sack full of money after a local bank is robbed. He gives the money away hoping to make other people's lives better though he does learn that handing out money to someone in need may not necessarily make their lives any better. This is a good coming of age story where an idealistic young man finds out about the realities of the world, though he is a sweet young man in wanting to help others in bad situations though at first he does have an ulterior motive in there in wanting to move to his Aunt Willie's house whom he thinks is rich but later on finds out that she is in as bad financial straits as he and his mom is even though she does live in a big house.

[spbooks_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Gentle narrative but found, about half way through, I was getting bored. Skimmed the last half. Reads more like a series of snapshots of life as a black kid in the 60s South. Some genuinely humorous stories and liked the premise of a young boy trying to work out what to do with the robbery money he finds. I wouldn't buy another book by this author.

[virginiagill · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Twenty-four hours after finishing this book and I still cannot decide whether I liked it. Much of the book felt very disjointed to me and I wasn't able to feel as if I could enter into the story itself. Then it hit me...perhaps this was never meant to read like a traditional novel, there would be too much to tell. Rather it's like viewing a verbal photo album. Beautifully written snapshots in the life of one young boy as he moves though an extraordinary time in our history.It was an interesting read and one I can see myself going back to just to revisit certain of the snapshots the author created.