BOOK DISCUSSION: THE HEAVEN AND EARTH GROCERY STORE (IN-PERSON)

Pottstown, PA, 1972. When a human skeleton is unearthed during the excavation for a housing development, the mystery points to old secrets. Chicken Hill, the site of the discovery, was historically a neighborhood of African Americans and immigrant Jews struggling to make their way in the context of white Christian America. Presiding over Chicken Hill’s Heaven and Earth Grocery Store is the kind and welcoming Chona, whose shop is a point of intersection for the diverse residents. When the neighborhood bands together to protect a deaf black boy from being institutionalized by the state, James McBride shows that it’s love and community that can move heaven and earth.

Read: The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store, James McBride