Through the Groves: A Memoir

Anne Hull's memoir Through the Groves is a richly evocative coming-of-age story set in the Florida orange groves of the 1960s. It captures the smells, sounds, rituals, and pressures of girlhood, as well as the casual racism of the rural South.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 224 pages
Publication date: 25 June 2024
Publisher: St Martin's Press

[Hull] has a keen eye for exquisite details and a sharp sense of storytelling, making her memoir a captivating read. [Carl Hiaasen] praised her work for its evocative portrayal of the Florida orange groves in the 1960s. [Hull] grew up in rural Central Florida, where she experienced the ground trembling from the construction of Walt Disney World. Her father warned her that everything would be gone, but the real threat was at home, where she was caught between her idealistic but self-destructive father and her glamorous outsider mother from Brooklyn. [Hull] felt the pressures of girlhood closing in and dreamed of becoming a traveling salesman, accompanied by her baton-twirling babysitter. As her sexual identity took shape, she knew that the place she loved would never love her back and began plotting her escape. [Hull] captures the smells, sounds, secret rituals, and rhythms of a doomed family, the casual racism of the rural South in the 1960s, and the suffocating expectations placed on girls and women. Her memoir is vividly atmospheric and haunting, making it a must-read for anyone who has ever left home to cut a path of their own.

Weight: 190g
Dimension: 202 x 125 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781250348203