Spare Change by Bette Lee Crosby

A Woman who is Superstitious to the Core…

A Boy who claims his Parents are Dead…

A Murderer who wants to Silence the Truth of What Happened.

Olivia Westerly knows what she knows — opals mean disaster, eleven is the unluckiest number on earth and children weigh a woman down like a pocketful of stones. That’s why she’s avoided marriage for almost forty years. But when Charlie Doyle happened along, he was simply too wonderful to resist. Now she’s a widow with an eleven-year-old boy claiming to be her grandson.

Spare Change is a quirky mix of Southern flair, serious thoughts about the important things in life, the madcap adventures of a young boy and a late change of heart that makes all the difference in an unusually independent woman.

With a foul mouth, dark secrets and heavily guarded emotions, Ethan Allen Doyle is not an easy child to like. He was counting on the grandpa he’d never met for a place to hide, but now that plan is shot to blazes because the grandpa’s dead too. He’s got seven dollars and twenty-six cents, his mama’s will for staying alive, and Dog. But none of those things are gonna help if Scooter Cobb finds him. ~~ synopsis from Goodreads

My thoughts about Spare Change ~~

I love the main characters of Olivia and Ethan Allen. They are as different as night and day, in some respects, but in other ways, they are meant to be together. Olivia is an independent woman who knows what she wants. No husband. No kids. An independent woman, before her time. And then there's Ethan Allen, (really parents, who does that?) the young boy who has to grow up quickly, when he should still be a kid.

I immediately connected with and admired both Olivia and Ethan Allen. They are both very likable, honest people who had bad things happen to them.

Spare Change is a delightful, homey story, with murder and mayhem thrown in, told with a little southern flavor that put a smile on my face as I was reading. There are some really great lines in the book. I am going to share just a few that I loved. 

'The year Ethan Allen became eleven was when things between Benjamin and Susanna turned rancid as a week old pork chop.'

Now if that doesn't create an image (or smell) for ya, I don't know what will.

'The Good Lord don't do things that way - when he sees a person's flat out of hope and feeling dead broke, He slips a bit of spare change into the bottom of their pocket; not a lot maybe, but enough for them to get by.'

I love it when I discover how the author connects the story to the title.

'I'm not really the boy's grandma and I've got no obligation, but I still feel for the child - everybody ought to have someone that loves them.' 

Ahhhhh.

'Let's see," Olivia mumbled, thinking out loud, 'there's a Methodist Church on the corner, and a block down there's a Baptist, then over on Grant Street, a Catholic Church ... they're all reasonably close by; which one do you think He's more likely to listen to?' Canasta laughed out loud. 'It don't make a bean of difference,' she finally said, 'the Lord listens in all those places. They're just different slices of the same pie.'

That is an awesome line - 'just different slices of the same pie.'

I love the way Bette writes.This story was very entertaining as well as being easy to read with wonderful, colorful characters. This is the first book of Bette's that I have read. I am definitely going to be reading more!

About the author

Award-winning novelist Bette Lee Crosby brings the wit and wisdom of her Southern Mama to works of fiction—the result is a delightful blend of humor, mystery and romance along with a cast of quirky charters who will steal your heart away.

Crosby’s work was first recognized in 2006 when she received The National League of American Pen Women Award for a then unpublished manuscript. Since then, she has gone on to win several more awards, including another NLAPW award, three Royal Palm Literary Awards, and the FPA President’s Book Award Gold Medal.

Her published novels to date are: Cracks in the Sidewalk (2009), Spare Change (2011), The Twelfth Child (2012), Cupid’s Christmas (2012) and What Matters Most (2013). She has also authored “Life in the Land of IS” a memoir of Lani Deauville, a woman the Guinness Book of Records lists as the world’s longest living quadriplegic.

Crosby originally studied art and began her career as a packaging designer. When asked to write a few lines of copy for the back of a pantyhose package, she discovered a love for words that was irrepressible. After years of writing for business, she turned to works of fiction and never looked back. “Storytelling is in my blood,” Crosby laughingly admits, “My mom was not a writer, but she was a captivating storyteller, so I find myself using bits and pieces of her voice in most everything I write."

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