Blue Eyes in Black Wonderland

Fiction. The Eastern Shore of Maryland is a world in-between: land and water, past and present, north and south, black and white, a landscape of great beauty and tragic history. Set in the early 1980’s, Blue Eyes in Black Wonderland chronicles the experiences of white, nineteen-year-old Celia Lennon, forced to drop out of college in California due to a family crisis. Going to live with her older sister, Grace, in small town Sutton, MD, she takes a job as a waitress at the elegant Grand Marsh Inn, where the vast majority of employees are black. Inadvertently and with the best of intentions, Celia runs afoul of the unspoken rules that govern social relations in small-town Sutton, becoming entangled in humorous, dangerous, and romantic predicaments to a surprising end. Blue Eyes in Black Wonderland is a coming of age novel which addresses issues of power and change, the ability of friendship to transform individuals and community, and the value of difference.Blue Eyes in Black Wonderland is a coming-of-age novel addressing the issues of diversity and change.