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The seeing started for Aletta Jacobs when she was just eight years old. Tessie Jones Maple, an elderly African-American woman from Okay County, would visit Aletta in her bedroom at night. Then there was Isabella from Italy. Both Tessie and Isabella had the same message for little Aletta --- that she was special and not to let others belittle her powerful gift. That Tessie and Isabella were long dead did not disturb Aletta. She found comfort and peace in their voices and in their messages. Aletta could see someone's past, their secrets and their futures just by touching their hands, an ability she quickly learned to hide from a fearful, skeptical world.
The daughter of a well-known Oklahoma farming family, Aletta's world was ruined overnight when her father Clovis and Uncle Joey were shot to death by Johnny Redding, an angry ex-employee. Fast forward three decades to 1976 and pretty Aletta is married to Jimmy Honor, the high school jock star who has lost nearly everything except his rebel yell, love for the bottle, and lust for other women. How Aletta allowed herself to have three children (and one more on the way in a month) with this handsome cad is the age-old question that has haunted so many broken American marriages, and books.
First-time novelist Dayna Dunbar artfully creates the confounding duality of Aletta, the strong woman awash in unfortunate circumstances in the Dust Bowl at the bicentennial. Celebrations and parades abound as Jimmy takes turns strangling vodka bottles and his wife, while professing his undying love for the three children he and Aletta share. In the chaos of brutal domestic fights, pointless drinking, infidelity, unpaid bills and an ocean of children's tears, Aletta is comforted by hairdresser neighbor Joy and other friends who condemn Jimmy and urge Aletta to take charge of her life and protect her kids.
Shedding her desire to suffer quietly, Aletta is forced to contend with a past she could not change and the future she must control by using her psychic power to earn money. At just $5 a reading, Aletta proves herself to the local community as the real thing. But, as life seems to be looking up, Aletta finds that her battles have only just begun: Jimmy sloshes back into the house, Aletta's bitter mother Nadine betrays her, the bible thumpers from Burning Bush Battle Church label Aletta a sinner, angry protests are held on the front lawn, and the feelings of loss for her father come roaring back to challenge Aletta's loosening grip on her own sanity.
If this isn't enough, Aletta must contend with a newborn, a biker gang, local cops, a high school pal who has turned to Hinduism, lots of gossip, and a bunch of reporters who find a psychic reader the most interesting thing to come along in years.
Evoking the troubles that make hit country songs, the author delivers just a few harsh twangs in her prose: "I can live with most anything, but not with lies," "…the language they used was as hard as the liquor," "Her mother poured water over her hair like a liquid hug," "…inside there were wings starting to grow on her heart." Nevertheless, Dunbar has created an insightful, heartbreaking and, at times, humorous look at the woman as victim in the desolate land of good ol' boys.
If Oprah still picked new novels for her Book Club, THE SAINTS AND SINNERS OF OKAY COUNTY would ring across the land, true as a dinner bell.
--- Reviewed by Brandon M. Stickney
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