"Hush Now, Baby" is the story of how a little white girl climbed out of an uneasy childhood in the segregated South on the backbone of a black woman who loved her unabashedly. A host of African-American women permeated Southern families. One of those stalwart women was Eva Aiken, a central figure in the author s life from her birth until Eva staged a sit-in at the girl s wedding.
The story captures the glorious early years of the Lowcountry South Carolina family then graphically depicts its unraveling. Eva holds them together. The family and the country s parallel struggles converge. The author lives in bubble-wrap until Civil Rights issues escalate. This story is told without pathos and with graceful restraint the Southern way.
Angela s prose plunges us back in time when a generation of white children were raised by the calloused hands of slaves who, despite being freed by Lincoln, remained chained to a stubborn way of life. Instead of killing us in our sleep, they became our guardian angels, for reasons still mysteriously misunderstood. --Ken Burger, author of" Swallow Savannah," " Sister Santee," "Salkehatchie Soup," and" Baptized in Sweet Tea.""