Blanche Passes Go

I'm sad that this is the last book featuring Blanche, but while there are some unresolved story arc, Blanche Passes Go is otherwise a fairly satisfying conclusion to Barbara Neely's series. As with previous installments, this is technically a murder mystery in that a murder occurs and Blanche is interested in finding out who committed it, but there's no real hunting for clues and not a single cop appears. Neely instead uses Blanche's trip back to her home town in North Carolina as a backdrop for her exploration of domestic violence, generational trauma, and racism. At times a tough read, but Blanche's voice is always distinct and clear enough to keep me reading on.

Rereading Blanche Passes Go proved incredibly bittersweet. While I absolutely adored this fourth novel in the Blanche White mystery series, I was heartbroken knowing that it’s the last one. I read Blanche Passes Go when it was first published in 2000, I expected the fifth book in a couple of years’ time. But years — and then a decade — came and went, and still no Blanche book from author Barbara Neely.

So I’ve been terribly grateful to Brash Books for re-releasing the original four books in paperback and the Kindle format. They’re just as fresh, just as topical, just as sassy and funny and touching as they were in the 1990s.

In Blanche Passes Go, Blanche takes a leave from her new home in Boston to return to her sleepy show more hometown of Farleigh, N.C., which she fled at the end of the first book in the series, Blanche on the Lam. Blanche is full of hope about her homecoming, meeting a new man and anticipating helping her best friend Ardell with her new catering business. But poor Blanche can’t get a break! On her first night back in town, who should she run into but David Palmer? The white, entitled rich boy Palmer raped Blanche eight years ago. Faced with living in fear or getting her own back, longtime readers can guess what Blanche will do…. However, readers won’t come close to guessing the shocking ending or the many twists and turns Neely sprinkles throughout Blanche Passes Go.

Which brings us to the 15 years we readers have waited for the next chapter in Blanche’s life. Please, please, Professor Neely! We don’t want to bid goodbye to Blanche! You’ve said that you saw mystery novels as a great vehicle for discussing race, class, gender, and other social issues for new audiences. The need for that still exists today! Have pity on us, and grace us with another Blanche book!

In the interest of full disclosure, I received this book from NetGalley and Brash Books in exchange for an honest review. show less

The outline of the story is in the blurb, so I won't re-iterate here. This is another engrossing book in the series, and when I finished, I felt a bit sad that there aren't more Blanche White books.

Aside from the main plot of interlocking investigations, the book deals a lot with racial issues, domestic abuse, interpersonal relations, families, strained friendships, female independence... The whole four-book series would be a great addition to any high school course in American Literature. If you're a secondary school teacher in the 21st century trying to decide between Huck Finn and Blanche White, I'd advise the latter. (Oh, wait a minute: there are frank passages in here about religion and sex that some parents might object to. Sorry, show more kids, you'll have to hide these books from Mom or just read 'em on your phone while pretending to check Instagr*m.) show less

This is the fourth and final book in the series, and I was so glad to finally read it after enjoying the other three several years ago. Yes, it's a mystery, but it is also a novel about race and class in America (the story takes place in the year 2000 in North Carolina). As Linda Ellerbee notes on the book jacket, "Neely writes from the perspective of Blanche, an intelligent, perceptive, poor, working-class black woman with a wry sense of humor and a healthy sense of place." Blanche is feisty, honest, and independent, the kind of girlfriend I'd like to hang out with.

This was an entertaining read. I can't say that I loved it, but it was enjoyable. I liked the character of Blanche, and her budding romance with Thelvin. The mystery was entertaining, but I didn't really like the resolution. Justice was not served. Maybe this was the point of the book, who knows. At times Blanche was a little too introspective, and had a tendency to read to much into people's motivations. Her relationship with Thelvin would have been a whole lot smoother if she didn't over analyze everything. The author tries to explain Blanche's fears, and it does make sense, but it also makes me wish she could just put aside her fears and go for the happiness.

This is a four book series and this is the last of it. I've now read all four.

Blanche is coming back to North Carolina to help her best friend, Ardell, with her catering business over the summer. Both Malek and Taifa are in their teens and working summer jobs, so Blanche is free to go. She is also coming back to face a man and an event, from her past, that have had sway on her life ever since.

On the train down she meets Thelvin, and there seems to be an instant attraction between them. Thelvin is the conductor and just happens to live in Durham, which is in close proximity to where Blanche will be staying in Farleigh. This thread of attraction runs through the book and is also influenced by Blanche's past.

Blanche is happy to be back and show more see Ardell. It is topped off when she finds that she will be living in the Miz Alice: the little two room cottage built by Ardell's Uncle Russell and named for the first, and pretty much only, tenant to move in, Miz Alice. This gives Blance privacy and freedom. Freedom to investigate into the life of the man whose actions caused Blanche to flee her town in the first place.

There are twists and turns, and Blanche has to really pry to get any information. It seems the place may consider itself to be part of the New South, but not much has really changed in the relationship between the blacks and whites. The information she is able to uncover and the reactions among the white community lead to unexpected results, for Blanche, her investigation and the people she is investigating. show less

Great read, 3rd of the series