Twelve-Year-Old Addy O’Donnell feels a mixture of pride and shame about being a member of “the meanest family on God’s green earth”. Hers has been a rough, hardscrabble existence on a tract of land belonging the lawless, violent O’Donnell clan of Smith County, Mississippi. Addy’s home territory is commonly known as “No-Bob”—so named after a freed black man made a fatal navigational error: he stepped onto O’Donnell land and never stepped off. A search party was sent to comb the O’Donnell woods for him. When those searching finally emerged from among the trees, they called out that there was “no Bob” to be found there. Bob had disappeared for good, but the words to mark his disappearance stuck.

This is McMullan’s second young-adult novel dealing with the American South’s Civil War experience. As it opens, Addy and her mother arrive at the wedding of a popular young couple, Irene and Frank Russell. The O’Donnells are filthy but hungry enough not to care if they’re seen eating at a wedding feast to which they haven’t been invited. Although it’s 1875, a full decade after the end of the war, the southern states remain in ruins. It’s not uncommon to stumble on bones of the war dead in the forest. Bandits regularly threaten travellers. Many people are still starving. Even the light is different now; the Yankees burned so much down that people are deprived of something as natural and basic as the shade from trees.

Confederate soldiers were supposed to turn in their weapons at war’s end, but most didn’t do so. Now many families are armed to the hilt at a time when resentments simmer, and it takes barely a spark of anger to produce a conflagration, especially among the volatile O’Donnells. (McMullen seems to suggest that the American South’s love affair with firearms was born during this period.) After the war, Addy’s father, Mark O’Donnell, returned to Smith County, but he apparently didn’t stay for long. As far as Addy and her mother know, he’s gone to Texas. He was supposed to send for them, but Addy is doubtful this will ever happen. At the Russells’ wedding, her mother meets a man with a mule who’s bound for Texas. She seizes the opportunity to go with him, hoping to locate the husband who deserted her. Addy is abandoned.

Frank and Irene Russell take Addy in. Frank is reluctant, having had his own troubles with the O’Donnells, but his tenderhearted wife prevails. Addy proceeds to make herself indispensable to the Russells. Rough as her Pappy may have been, he taught Addy a lot. She can manage chores as well as any man, and she knows how to survive. In time, Frank, a teacher, is won over by the girl, and he arranges for her to attend school. She becomes fast friends with Frank’s younger sister. These are Addy’s first steps in crossing from lawless No-Bob with its primitive code of honour and loyalty to a kinder, more civilized life. Additional hard steps will be demanded of her.

Soon a geography project has Addy and her friend mapping an unfamiliar patch of land where a dual-purpose church/school house for coloured folks stands. One evening the two girls witness an attack on the schoolhouse during a church service. Hooded men arrive on horseback while members of the congregation sing hymns inside. A flaming cross falls on the schoolhouse, setting it ablaze. Addy rushes inside in an attempt to save her younger friend, a little black boy, Jess Still. He dies, and Addy knows who is responsible.

McMullan’s book explores Addy’s struggle to do the right thing, muster the courage to inform on her own people. The girl finds herself back in No-Bob for a time, after her father comes to collect her. It turns out that he was not in Texas at all, only hiding in the woods. He’s been instrumental in the formation the local Ku Klux Klan, which he views as a tool for “cleaning up” the county. Later, Addy wanders in the wilderness for several weeks and then spends some interesting time with the displaced Choctaw Indians, whose culture and mythology McMullan deftly and economically weaves into the story. (I was surprised to learn that “Little People”, tiny mythical beings who may trick or assist humans, figure in Choctaw lore, just as they do in the stories of Canada’s Inuit people.)

I was impressed with McMullan’s first novel, and I am almost as impressed with her second— for the information it provides about southern culture and history and for a narrative that hinges on a protagonist’s intense moral dilemma. However, the author has trouble bringing this second novel to a satisfying conclusion. In its last third, she expects her reader to swallow a few too many good things. The Russells’ fondness for Addy is convincing enough, but Frank’s restored relationship with another member of the O’Donnell clan is just a bridge too far. More significantly, by the end, Addy no longer sounds or acts much like the girl the reader has come to know. There really is such a thing as becoming too much of a heroine. ( )

Addy's pappy left years ago for Texas. Then her mother decides to follow, leaving 12-year-old Addy alone. She is taken in by the local schoolteacher and his wife, and works hard to be seen as herself, and not as a no-good O'Donnell from No-Bob. Set 10 years after the civil war, this is a time of poverty, rebuilding and changing race relations in the South. When Addy's pappy shows up and tries to reclaim her, she needs to decide how her life should be. ( )

12 year old Addy is the youngest member of the locally deplored and infamous O’Donnell clan, a matter for both pride and shame. When she is finally abandoned by her mother, in the wake of her father’s leaving, Addy is taken in by the local schoolteacher. She struggles with feelings of loss and confusion at her torn loyalties, as the KKK not only gains a foothold in the area, but proves to have an uncomfortable tie to Addy’s own home life. McMullan allows Addy to narrate events and feelings in a wise and practical manner that breathes warmth throughout the story.

I didn’t realise until about half-way through that this is a sequel to How I Found the Strong, which tells the story of Frank, a young boy caught up in the tumult of the war (and is, incidentally, biographical fiction, loosely based on the author’s family). Even without reading this first, it added a richness to the story to know there was a history to the character who takes in Addy.

Definitely a young adult read, When I Crossed No-Bob deftly deals with racism, poverty and family loyalties in the American South just after the Civil War. McMullan has a lovely writing style that never intrudes on the story or her character’s ‘voice’ and the well-researched background manages to infuse atmosphere without suggesting an author with a list of proudly-learned facts to impart.

I have made a note to get a copy of How I Found the Strong and catch up with the story that came before Addy’s. ( )

It’s Addy’s story of her poor mountain community, family loyalties (or lack of in some cases) and learning to decide for herself the kind of person she wants to be. You get a good insight for all points of view for each of the characters, even if it is through someone else's observations. AHS/LB

Read my review at www.yasarah.blogspot.com ( )