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Book Review:
Ya-Yas in Bloom, Rebecca Wells
An emotionally charged addition to Rebecca Wells' award-winning bestseller Little Altars Everywhere and #1 New York Times bestseller Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood, Ya-Yas in Bloom reveals the roots of the Ya-Yas' friendship in the 1930s and roars with all the raw power of Vivi Abbott Walker's 1962 T-Bird through sixty years of marriage, child-raising, and hair-raising family secrets.
YA-YAS IN BLOOM
Format: Hardcover
Pages: 272
Publisher: Harper Collins
Publishing Date: March 17, 2005
When four-year-old Teensy Whitman prisses one time too many and stuffs a big old pecan up her nose, she sets off the chain of events that lead Vivi, Teensy, Caro, and Necie to become true sister-friends. Told in alternating voices of Vivi and the Petite Ya-Yas, Siddalee and Baylor Walker, as well as other denizens of Thornton, Louisiana, Ya-Yas in Bloom show us the Ya-Yas in love and at war with convention. Through crises of faith and hilarious lapses of parenting skills, brushes with alcoholism and glimpses of the dark reality of racial bigotry, the Ya-Ya values of unconditional loyalty, high style, and Cajun sass shine through. Necie's wise credo, "Just think pretty pink and blue thoughts," helps too...
But in the Ya-Yas' inimitable way, these four remarkable women also teach their children about the Mysteries: the wonder of snow in the deep South, the possibility that humans are made of stars, and the belief that miracles do happen. And they need a miracle when old grudges and wounded psyches lead to a heartbreaking crime...and the dynamic web of sisterhood is the only safety net strong enough to hold families together and endure.
After two bestsellers and a blockbuster movie, the Ya-Yas have become part of American culture - icons for the power of women's friendship. Ya-Yas in Bloom continues the saga, giving us more Ya-Ya lore, spun out in the rich patois of the Louisiana bayou country and brim full of the Ya-Ya message to embrace life and each other with joy.
Several years ago (in 2003 to be exact), I rented a little movie called Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood from my local video store. The film starred the likes of Sandra Bullock, Ashley Judd, Ellen Burstyn, and (Dame) Maggie Smith, and was directed by Callie Khouri, who also co-produced Thelma & Louise. This film just screamed grrl power all the way. I ran home from the video store in a gleeful haze.
Sandra Bullock plays Siddalee "Sidda" Walker, a New York playwright with an ambivalent attitude towards her mother, Viviane "Vivi" Abbott Walker (editor's note: nicknames run rampant in Rebecca Wells' world). Vivi wasn't the most conventional mother, so Sidda blames all her dysfunctions on her childhood, prompting Vivi to stop speaking to her daughter altogether. Enter the Ya-Yas, Vivi's childhood chums, who step in and clumsily kidnap Sidda in the hopes of reuniting mother and daughter. Many flashbacks of Vivi's wild, turbulent adolescence ensue, followed by Sidda's realization that her mother isn't all that bad.
The film itself was one of those feel-good deals that leaves you happy in the end, as one is to suspect with these types of stories, but the feeling soon leaves the next day as the coffee maker runs out of juice and the boss spontaneously decides that it's employee evaluation day. In other words, Divine Secrets was a decent movie, but it doesn't quite linger like a superior film might.
So when I read Ya-Yas in Bloom, Wells' follow-up to Divine Secrets, it seemed conceivable that the film had probably been more liberal with character sketches and plot lines than was necessary. And that's what usually happens with books that are hastily adapted to the big screen - the loss in translation is sometimes overwhelming. Although I haven't been privy to the Divine Secrets novel, the characters in Ya-Yas in Bloom were the familiar protagonists that I had seen some years ago on my television screen, but slightly more bigger-than-life than the film suggests.
Ya-Yas in Bloom is a fragmented tale that embellishes, rather than picks up from, the previous Ya-Ya books. "A Little Love Gift," the opener of the novel, is told from Vivi's point of view in present 1994. The book then jumps to 1930 with "The Legacy of Teensy's Pecan," where we learn how the Ya-Yas came to be the best friends and sisters they are today. As the story progresses, and as we meet the rest of the young Ya-Yas - Caro and Necie - it is clear that these children, although as different as night and day, will grow old and happy together. Wells, through her Cajun-mixed colloquialisms and vivid imagery, manages to infuse charming, child-like innocence with beautiful prose while pacing the story well.
"Scenes From My Early Career" jumps to Sidda, who recounts an infamous Ya-Ya Valentine's Day cocktail party (the Ya-Yas like to throw parties). In meticulous detail, we are transported to the Walker's living room where festivities abound, and a then eight-year-old Sidda sits with the Ya-Yas, watching the glorious women get ready for their big musical number.
The book advances in the same vein thereafter, jumping from Baylor (Vivi's youngest child) in 1964, to local Myrtis Spevey (the Ya-Yas' bitter, jealous classmate) in 1961, to Edythe Spevey (Myrtis' not-quite-right daughter) in 1994, and then back to Baylor. Each chapter serves as a snippet into the dynamics of the Ya-Yas (who, although born and raised in the demure South, are no shrinking violets), their children, and to a lesser extent, the small microcosm of Thornton, Louisiana, a tiny southern town where everybody knows your name, and fathers take their boys hunting on weekends.
Wells has a deft hand in storytelling, but the novel falters in its second act. After an action-packed Beatles concert recollected by Sidda, we jump to Myrtis Spevey, the aforementioned obsessed Ya-Ya classmate who has grown into an amazingly bitter woman. Here, Spevey is drawn very one-dimensional; in one part of her rant against the Ya-Yas, Wells writes, "Myrtis herself would not have been caught dead running around with Vivi and her girlfriends…Not if they had begged her to come of one of their parties at Spring Creek. Not if they had gotten down on their fou-fou little rich knees and prayed for Myrtis to become a part of their group…She had her snubs planned. She had long assorted lists of snubs that she practiced in bed at night. But she never had the chance to use them." Obviously, Spevey is fantastically acrimonious and perhaps a little crazy, and the Ya-Yas are perfect and everyone envies them. A little more subtlety, instead of a full-out attack, would have sufficed, and the chapter seems misplaced in the rest of the book.
Next, we come to Edythe Spevey, Myrtis' daughter. If Myrtis Spevey is the equivalent of Michael Jackson in present-day terms, then Edythe is Marshall Herff Applewhite. Myrtis has a diabolical plan against one of the Petite Ya-Yas (that would be the daughter of one of the Ya-Yas), and manages to execute it, sending the now-elderly Ya-Yas into full-out sisterhood mode. The women band together and manage to thwart Myrtis, and all is right with the world again. This was perhaps one of the more interesting plot points of the novel, but unfortunately, the problem and the emotional repercussions of the event are short-lived and snipped off carefully just in time for the last act.
By the end of the novel, the Ya-Yas and their various family members gather together for their annual Christmas party (the Ya-Yas like to throw parties). Full of love, hope and faith, Wells wraps up the book on a high, inspirational note. Even George, Necie's grumpy husband, shows a glimmer of humanity after being drawn as a close-minded, callous man.
Future readers of Ya-Yas in Bloom might want to pick up Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood first to acquaint themselves with the myriad of characters that comprise Wells' rich tapestry. Wells' novel manages to find the beauty in the most mundane things, and paints a colourful picture of the lives of four astounding women. Although the novel's structure might be off-putting, the overall effect is worth reading. C.Ho.
YA-YAS IN BLOOM:
out of 5
