Summary of Where the Crawdads Sing By Delia Owens

By Willie M. Joseph

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Summary of Where the Crawdads Sing By Delia Owens

 

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Where the Crawdads Sing is at once an exquisite ode to the natural world, a heartbreaking coming-of-age story, and a surprising tale of possible murder. Kya Clark has survived for years alone in the marsh that she calls home, finding friends in the gulls and lessons in the sand.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Willie M. Joseph
• Release date: Jul 17, 2022
• ISBN: 9798201314217

Willie M. Joseph

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Prologue

1969

On October 30, 1969, the body of Chase Andrews lay in the swamp, which would have absorbed it silently, routinely. There are sounds, but compared to the marsh, the swamp is quiet because decomposition is cellular work. Life decays and reeks and returns to the rotted duff.

Ma

1952

She saw her mother in high heels made of fake alligator skin and a blue train case. Kya knew her mother would return with meat or chicken, but Ma never took a case. Ma'll be back, Jodie says to Kya as she watches her leave. She's wearin' her gator shoes, Kya says, like she's goin' somewheres big. The shack sat on a fragile shoreline along what would become the North Carolina coast.

MA DIDN'T COME BACK that swamp became a net, scooping up mutinous sailors, castaways, debtors, and fugitives dodging wars. Like river rats, each had his own territory, yet had to fit into the fringe or simply disappear some day in the swamp. Kya couldn't eat. She sat on the porch steps, looking down the lane. Just that morning she'd awakened to fatback crackling in the iron skillet and whiffs of biscuits browning in the wood oven.

Ma had been quiet; her smile lost, her eyes red. Ya wanta play explorers? he asked. Nah, I just said that. Never too old, she replied.

Jodie

1952

After Ma left, Kya's oldest brother and two sisters drifted away too, as if by example. They endured Pa's red-faced rages, which started as shouts then escalated into fistslugs. One by one they disappeared, leaving Kya with just Jodie and Pa. Jodie's things were already gone, his floor bed stripped bare. All her life the room had been warmed from baking bread, boiling butter beans, or bubbling fish stew.

Who's gonna cook? she asked out loud. Could have asked, Who's gonna dance? For three days, Kya boiled turnip greens from Ma's garden for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. She walked out to the chicken coop for eggs but found it bare. Pa was throwing Ma's paintings, dresses, and books onto the bonfire in the yard.

A week after Jodie left, the Frigidaire stood empty and hardly any turnips remained. Pa's weekly disability checks were their only source of income. For the first time ever Kya walked alone toward the village of Barkley Cove to buy groceries. Barkley Cove was literally a backwater town, bits scattered here and there among the estuaries and reeds like an egret's nest flung by the wind. For more than two hundred years, sharp salty winds had weathered the cedar-shingled buildings to the color of rust.

What ya got to say for yo'self, Chase?. Kya's Ma used to say, Never run in town or people'll think you stole something. Git on with ya. Now Kya ran as far as she could and then speedwalked the rest. The next week she bought backbones and boiled them with grits and collard greens for soup.

Kya couldn't remember her birthday, but Pa always said the autumn moon showed up for her. She made his bed and washed his dishes to keep the shack decent for Ma's return. Kya willed Ma to be walking toward the shack, still in her alligator shoes and long skirt.

Chase

1969

Chase Andrewses had ordered every spark plug,