Beginning With Cannonballs by Jill McCroskey Coupe

The year is 1951 and the place is Knoxville, Tennessee.  Gail and Hanna are best friends, eight years old and raised like sisters and even sharing a crib for months.  But will that friendship last?  Sophie, Hannah's mother, doubts it for a very good reason.  Gail is the daughter of her white employers, the Madisons Hanna is her daughter and an African American.  Although Sophie and Hanna live with the Madisons all week, there is a definite line drawn.  They live in the basement and it's clear who is in charge.

As the girls grow older, Gail still wants the friendship she has known, but after Sophie and Hanna move back home, Hanna starts to realize the very big differences in the girl's circumstances and futures.  The relationship gets strained and then when the girls are fifteen, Sophie and her family move to Philadelphia.  Gail is desperate to retain her friendship with Hanna but her mother, Bessie, sees this as the perfect opportunity to put an end to a relationship she has been uncomfortable with for years.  When Hanna writes to Gail, Bessie hides the letters until they slow to a trickle and then stop.

But Gail is determined.  Once she is out and in college, she finds a way to locate Hanna and try to rekindle things.  This becomes the pattern over the years.  No matter how many months or even years have gone by, Gail is determined to keep trying with Hanna and is there for all the big events in Hanna's life.   As the two age, they come to an understanding about the one friendship that has endured for all their lives.

Jill McCroskey Coupe has written a thoughtful novel about the meaning of friendship and about the awkwardness that characterized even the best of friendships that crossed the ethnic line in the 1950's and 1960's in this country.  The two women in the novel are about ten years older than me and I remember those times and the clear line that was drawn.  I grew up in a small Southern town and there were definitely two different experiences depending on your skin color.   This novel is recommended for readers of women's fiction and those interested in exploring what friendship means.