It was a gorgeous day. Beautiful spreading oaks that once defined the dividing line between the Creek and Cherokee Indians now met each other’s limbs over North Peachtree Street, forming a summertime shade tunnel for the travelers. While the horses clip-clopped along on the cobblestone streets of Norcross on their way to Peachtree Corners, Roberta and Amanda sat on pillows on the floorboard of the wagon, waving to everyone they passed. They were wearing pastel yellow and pink sundresses, matching bonnets, and swimsuits underneath. To hold their bonnets in place, they each tied scarves over their hats, securing them with bows tied under their chins. Amanda was sporting her Christmas scarf. It would have been impossible to decide which of the young women was more lovely. But for each person who returned their waves, there was another who frowned at the sight of two women of two races out for a ride together. Roberta frowned at the people who disapproved, throwing them her best, most-disgusted look. But Amanda was stoic.

“I’m used to it, Miss Bobbie,” Mandy said, waving off their rudeness.

“Well, I certainly am not. I want to punch their faces.”

Ellis called from the front. “Want me to stop so you can take them on?” He grinned.

“No!” Roberta said. “But I am simply amazed at some people’s attitudes!”

“Well, I am not amazed,” Amanda said. “Just look at what happened to my mother.”

“What exactly DID happen to her?” Roberta asked quietly, so Ellis could not hear.

“How would I know? She died having me. But I can tell you for certain, it was not good.”

The three travelers rode along in silence for a bit. Wanting to ease the situation, Roberta opened the morning’s Atlanta Journal Constitution newspaper.

“Mandy! It says here that my most-favorite professor at the university, Dr. W. E. B. Du Bois, has a new book coming out, ‘The Souls of Black Folks.’

This reviewer says he writes about Ralph Waldo Emerson’s theory of ‘double consciousness’ as applicable to the Negro perspective, that Black people must have two fields of vision at all times.”

“Well. You don’t say. At least two!” Amanda was becoming more and more capable of sarcasm. “Did you meet him or get to know him?”

“No, he kept to himself. But he is handsome, and he is brilliant. You have to pay attention to every word he says, or you’ll get lost.” She rested the newspaper on her lap before continuing. “It’s such a shame what happened to his little boy. I don’t think he ever got over it.”

“Didn’t he die, or get really sick or something?”

“Yes, he died when he was only two. People said it was diphtheria.”

“Miss Bobbie, if you were a colored woman, you’d understand what he meant about ‘double consciousness.’ You wouldn’t have to buy his book to read about it.”

“How do you know about it?” Bobbie asked.

“I get around.”

“Oh really? Where?”

“I’m getting around with you right now, aren’t I?”

Roberta smiled at Amanda. Her lovely funny sister-friend was full of surprises.

“My dear. I do not have, nor will I ever have, the colored experience or the colored perspective. But surely it cannot be too different from being first, a woman and second, a Catholic in the South. I always have a double consciousness, going through life as I see myself, and going through life as others see me. As less than a man, and less God-loving as a Catholic.”

“My dear Roberta, your score is then what? Two out of three? Take my word for it. You simply do not have any idea what it means to be Black.”

• Unknown: “84-years-old Japanese sailor”: 5 stars. I just finished reading the most interesting, informative, entertaining, and enlightening book in English I ever read, since “Roots” decades ago.

• Jim Olson, environmental attorney, Traverse City, MI: Here is a writer and novel that continues the tradition of great literary storytelling from Kentucky and the South, the likes of Wendell Berry and Harper Lee.

• Dr. Ralph M. Faris, professor of sociology, author, Lebanon, NH: You may search the entire history of literature for a novel with as many virtues as Gabrielle Gray’s To Each the Other Sent. Her book contains impressively interwoven narratives, providing compelling and poignant stories of four families over the course of a century. She has produced a masterpiece of romance, political intrigue, and personal pathos embedded in the life experiences of multiple characters, all of whom are struggling to survive and thrive during one of the most turbulent and historically unique periods in American history. All the family members are described through the prism of their complexity and significance in the larger story being told. The author reveals a deep appreciation for the roles each played in the early period of the families' development. There is so much to celebrate about the unfolding of their stories, especially in the writing style the author employs. She presents those accounts in a way that demonstrates she knows more about the characters than anyone else, and they are wonderfully enriched presentations indeed. Through her descriptions of them, readers learn the pertinent details of their psychology, their politics, their religion, and more, such that they help explain the socio-cultural times in which they lived. This book is clearly a tour de force.

• Andrew Solberg, retired Commander, Washington DC Police Force: ‘Sprawling saga’ is a term not sprawling enough to describe the saga of these families from Georgia and Kentucky, who come together at the end of the 19th century to define not only the genealogy of our author of this magnificent story but a tale of what it is that makes these individuals moving from the end of one century into the start of another so quintessentially American. With family histories rooted in England, Germany, and Ireland, filtered through a very southern post-Civil War sensibility but with the enthusiasm and joy of what the new century might hold, there is love, poetry, music, painting, Cicero, dancing, cooking, flirting, and so much more. A duel is agreed upon by two men interested in winning the affection of a young woman, and the weapons are…. And oh, the sex! Kentucky is a major character in the story, so of course there are horses, and there is bourbon. More sex here than whiskey, I think, but enough bourbon that I got a buzz just reading these chapters. But there is also violence, horror, and sadness, the constant threat of what will happen to mixed-race lovers or the people who try to help them. Two men die on the railroad tracks in a heartbreaking encounter where no one is entirely at fault but their families are forever shattered. Children, a lot of them, do not survive the womb or early childhood, and often their mothers do not survive birthing. Spanish Flu decimates Frankfort and wipes out entire families. Children suffer seizures, there are kidnappings. A governor is assassinated. A man of a different faith dies, a victim of despair. Many confront the noxious “twin towers of tyranny,” Catholicism and the social strictures of the times. The evil of racism pervades this book like an entire character we are not able to separate ourselves from. The writing is so strong on this that I would say the author conveys its insidious nature as powerfully as books such as The Known World, Washington Black, or Percival Everett’s recent James. The writing is exquisite. It is poetic and lyrical and elegant. At the same time, the writing shows so much hilarious understatement that parts are laugh-out-loud funny. In all, the writing displays the same great joy and excitement that drive these characters into our hearts and memories as such grand examples of how proud, loving, graceful, and courageous people created the early stages of American life in the 20th century. I loved these people. Hard working, joyous, happy, horny as hell, attuned to the beautiful sensations of music and written and spoken word, bedeviled by the social plagues of racism and religious intolerance yet striving forever onward toward a more socially just universe, I loved living with them in this wonderful tribute to a society where I always felt that the bitter tang of life is ever-present, but that better days are no doubt ahead.

• CeCe Butcher, visual artist and teacher, Somerset, KY - I'm DWELLING and loving spending the day in your book. It just gets better and better- each chapter is more fascinating than the last!! I love, love, love these people!!!!!  And your writing! You are brilliant....

• Jo E Hayden, photographer, Science Hill, KY: I’m enjoying the book - so glad you wrote it and shared it with the world and me. ❤️🙏❤️

• Christine Walton, sociologist, Torch Lake, MI: I’m enjoying your book as you write with sophisticated wittiness.

• Sandy Evans, NP, Somerset, KY: Just finished your book. I LOVED IT!!

• Dr. Roger Humphrey, surgeon, Owensboro, KY: I knew you could write grants and such, but this? I never knew you could write like this! This book is amazing and I’m SO VERY PROUD OF YOU!!! 

• Kathryn Fruge, Bloomington, IN: Enjoying your book!

• Burney Manning, Unitarian minister, Pulaski Colunty, KY: Both of us have read your book. We are amazed at your talent. You should do another one.

• Helen Compton, Somerset, KY: I am reading it now and wow … loving it

• Liz Isascs, Somerset, KY: Oh Gabrielle, my house is going to rack and ruin because I just can’t stop reading your book at every possible moment. I’m on Part 10 now…

• Ron Tipton, Kentucky historian, Owensboro, KY: If you're an admirer of closeknit families you'll love this book. This fictionalized novel is so very well written about the authors deep-rooted family spanning three generations from Kentucky and Georgia, that the reader can find themselves nearly believing every word they’re reading. Highly recommended!!

• John Nelson, newspaper editor, Danville KY: A thoroughly enjoyable read. A nice mix of fact and fiction, and often difficult to speculate the difference. I found it particularly relatable. My mother was from Frankfort and my grandmother lived in an apartment just a couple blocks from the old capitol. When we visited, my sister and I would walk down to play on the grounds and look around inside. I’m also sure I’ve been in the Sower building, even recently for a dinner and a drink or a business meeting. There are other familiarities. My grandfather was a prison guard in Frankfort and died when Mom was very young. Congratulations again on the book. It brought many a smile.

• Jane Harrod, statewide Kentucky ravaged lands restorer and musician, past President of Kentuckians for the Commonwealth, Frankfort, KY: Gabrielle’s hutzpah, talent and fearlessness, her kindness and givingness, make her one of the most amazing people I know. Don’t miss this first novel by one of Kentucky’s incredibly talented women.

• Sher Schachameyer, graphic designer, Bayfield, WI: Based on Gabrielle’s own family history, this book is an engaging saga of the loves, losses, fears, triumphs, setbacks and resilience of several generations. It abounds with drama and romance.

• Ingemar Johansson, community mental health CEO and musician, Honor, MI: When diving into this book, I was instantly immersed into life in the South in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It was with great anticipation I turned each page as the story unfolded. This is a masterfully woven tale, a must read.

• Maggie Sprattmoran, early childhood educator, Empire MI, 5 stars: This love story spans pivotal generations in American history as racial tensions mounted, social norms were in flux and the fabric of our nation was challenged. Religion, poetry and music are as central to the story as its enchanting characters. Read this book! I enjoyed the entwining threads of love, music, religion, and family. The characters are intriguing and enchanting- what a family; and to think that it’s deeply rooted in the truth of the author’s family! The quest to find one’s place and meaning are well explored over the generations. The author handled the role of religion even handedly; she didn’t flinch when religion tore a family apart, nor did she avoid the opportunities of religion. The exposed violent racism was intense and a potent reminder of what has been and could be again should we drop our guard. I thoroughly enjoyed this book.

• Joe Gray, documentary filmmaker, Louisville, KY: What is family legacy? Is it property? Cash? Or is it intangible and spiritual? Detailing an era so vividly that one can readily imagine being there, two families create a legacy of social justice cemented by a sometimes challenged but ever steadfast belief in a God of mercy and love.

• Patrick Moore, anesthesiologist, psychiatrist, musician, New Albany, IN:  Extremely well written & interesting -- has all the basic common sense yet crazy Catholic themes… also the blatant patriarchy… issues still relevant to all women and Christians. It will raise awareness of the multifaceted but profound effect religious teaching/doctrine impacts people at the pragmatic level. This book is filled with romance, riveting tales, & historical realities. Overall, it is reminiscent of “The Sound of Music” in the positive light it shines on family and the Church, combined with historical drama not unlike “Dr. Zhivago,” with many crucial underlying themes having to do with not only non-sequiturs regarding religious doctrine, but also women’s identity and surviving patriarchy. There are many levels of appeal. This is a massive project with great breadth, historical and cultural insights and implications. The delicacy & detail in every ‘scene’ in the book stimulate one’s imagination tremendously.  It’s a book that’s able to merge with one’s mind to inwardly and easily experience the totality of the tale.

• Raynae Redman, musician, Idaho, 5 stars: I just finished this novel!!!!!! Once I got 50 pages into it, I could hardly put it down. This novel is very engaging. The author wrote it based on journals, letters, pictures and her knowledge of her family, but it’s not just a novel for a family member to read. This book is a good one for anyone who’s looking for their next good book. It’s from a time period in the late 1800’s to the early 1930’s and deals with prejudices in the Deep South, the flu pandemic that killed so many, and a lot of insight into the Catholic religion. It’s about love stories that tug at your heart and give a person great passion for the people. It’s written in a very easy to read and enjoyable style. A person doesn’t have to be a member of this family to enjoy the novel because it tells good stories that are very fun to read about. I highly recommend this book as a good, enjoyable read. An amazing first novel.

• Jerry Cruse Brock, elementary school teacher, Danville KY, 5 stars. A touching story. A bonus for me was reading about familiar places in Kentucky. But it primarily is a story about families and could be set in many places. I seriously loved it. I am partial to stories about families and history, so I got BOTH.

• Keith Schneider, environmental journalist, New York Times correspondent, 5 stars. A terrific read from an author who knows her people. A powerful story of family, loyalty, race, and religion from two southern states from 1880 to 1935. Very well told and expertly paced for contemporary audiences. Unforgettable characters and well-crafted dialogue. A really fine read.

• Unknown reader: Brilliant!! 5 stars. What an intimate, wonderful & compelling story of a family's survival through decades of Kentucky's religious, cultural & political upheaval - Highly Recommend!

• David Mattingly, Chicago, IL attorney, 5 stars. The book is a fascinating fictionalized history of a real southern, Catholic family fighting to find love and for social justice in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. This amazingly rich saga is unfailingly optimistic in its tone and offers reassurance of the fundamental goodness of people.

• Unknown reader, 5 stars: The importance of family, legacy and shared experiences that help shape one’s life. I celebrate the author, her dedication and accomplishment of bringing families’ lives and words to the page for we the readers to experience.

• Unknown reader, 5 stars: It’s so well written that a person can hardly put it down once you start the book.

• Jane Faris, RN, Audubon, NJ: This fascinating novel is nearly impossible to put down, so prepare to fight the urge to ‘binge read’ if you value your sleep! The characters are extremely well-developed, with the steady drumbeat of history skillfully interwoven throughout. Don’t miss this magnificently-written historical fiction novel!

• Wanda Fries, author and creative writing professor, Somerset Community College: I enjoyed particularly your descriptions of the characters and of their place and time, which is one of the primary joys of reading historical novels. Of course, the detail about the place of music in the lives of Mamie and Henry and Nora and B.S. was beautifully rendered. And what an interesting project to take on! I'm not sure if I have ever read anything quite like it. The novel sure made me grateful for birth control pills and more info about how to have sex without babies. All the historical challenges your characters faced--the Spanish flu, the Depression--were well done. The refusal of the church to offer dispensation even at the risk of a woman's health was quite harrowing. Unfortunately, many have the same attitudes in this country now, as well as the bigotry and racism that you depict in your novel. I loved that Amanda is allowed an existence of her own outside the pages of the novel, and that she was granted to agency to fly off and take her life into her own hands. What a wonderful accomplishment and an extraordinary project to take on. I reiterate that I've never seen anything quite like it.

• Pierce Homer, former Virginia Secretary of Transportation, Richmond, VA: This is a great book. The narrative keeps pulling you along. Even though I knew where the story would likely end up, there was a kind of “who done it” quality to the narrative that made me want to open it up every day, even if only for a few pages, and find out what happened next. I found the childbirth sections among the most compelling, scary and moving, of any fiction or non-fiction I have read. It’s also a sad story of our troubled past and a warning to our equally troubled present. And a peek at both sides of Catholic practices in the South. I don’t know if you ever read any of the LBJ biographies by Robert Caro (great stuff), but his wife wrote two chapters about the grueling nature of housework in the Texas HilI Country. Some of the best creative non-fiction ever. Your sections on childbirth and child care and maternal health rank right up there. I hope you do another.

• Toro Okuno, Yokohama, Japan: Wonderful! We had your book introduced in the Moon Shiner, the Japanese bluegrass magazine. We will send you a copy.

• Mary Doub, Grey Fox Bluegrass Festival Founder and Producer, Baltimore, MD: Great book!

• Jenny Williams, Yoga master, Somerset, KY: How wonderful! I enjoyed it!

• Jim Walker: Senior Public Housing Revitalization Specialist, HUD, Birmingham, AL: This book is great! Congratulations!

• Gerrye Randall, Somerset, KY: It’s wonderful

• John Perkins, retired Postmaster, Somerset, KY: An outstanding achievement. Everyone that knows you isn’t surprised.

• Mia Hansford, visual artist, Chattanooga, TN: How powerful!

• Libby Mattingly: Much of the book’s historical setting is in Louisville, so it will be loved by and have special meaning for Louisvillians. So proud of you!

• Ingrid Gillespie: I loved reading this book!! Excellent stories! Congratulations! I so enjoyed all the stories, especially mentions of baby Jane. I remember hearing how well attended Little Mama’s funeral was, but did not realize how impactful her life truly was for so very many people. Excellent writing! My friends are asking to read my copy. I hope you write more (please!).

• Hayden Mattingly, PhD, Director of Environmental Studies, Tennessee Tech University: Many congratulations on the Courier Journal recommendation! That’s an amazing achievement to be selected from all those books. One thing that strikes me about your book is how conceptually original and unique it is — I’ve never read anything quite like it — seems like you’ve broken new ground so to speak, and people are responding to that originality. Another interesting aspect is all the behind-the-scenes research that you did to make it all come together. I can only imagine all the hours it took to get those details in place, but the details make such a difference. For example, the way you describe the “Pierce” logo on the Medlock’s new car was just brilliant — a great piece of writing and such examples are everywhere. Hats off!

• Fr Christian Moore, Franciscan priest, Louisville: I remember your grandfather George who let us older grandchildren go into the stockyards and play all day in the haystacks. We would have a blast! Large bales of hay we could jump off and not get hurt. They lived on Cherokee Road in Louisville! What a wonderful guy. Especially I remember your father Ben Spalding senior! He was a poet and musician of the first class. Years ago we went to see the Song of the South in Somerset and he was singing “zipidi-du-dah” and dancing with us for the next several days!

  You got music from both sides of the family, Ben and Nora!!

• Julie Hoff, Head Principal, Pulaski County High School, Somerset, Kentucky: Gabrielle! I just finished your book! Oh my goodness — how beautiful! Some of it was heartbreaking, of course, but what a beautiful story about such an extraordinary family.

‘Sprawling saga’ is a term not sprawling enough to describe the saga of these families from Georgia and Kentucky, who come together at the end of the 19th century to define not only the genealogy of our author of this magnificent story but a tale of what it is that makes these individuals moving from the end of one century into the start of another so quintessentially American. 

With family histories rooted in England, Germany, and Ireland, filtered through a very southern post-Civil War sensibility but with the enthusiasm and joy of what the new century might hold, there is love, poetry, music, painting, Cicero, dancing, cooking, flirting, even a beautiful woman riding an elephant. A duel is agreed upon by two men interested in winning the affection of a young woman, and the weapons are…horseshoes. And there is sex. Oh, the sex!

Kentucky and Georgia are major characters in the story, so of course there are horses, and there is bourbon. More sex here than whisky, I think, but enough bourbon (and Irish whisky and cognac) that I got a buzz just reading these chapters.

But there is also violence, horror, sadness and the constant threat of what will happen to mixed-race lovers or the people who are assisting them. Two men die on the railroad tracks in a heartbreaking encounter where no one is entirely at fault, but their families are forever shattered. Children, a lot of them, do not survive the womb or early childhood, and often their mothers do not survive birthing. Spanish Flu decimates Frankfort and wipes out entire families. Children suffer seizures, there are kidnappings. A governor is assassinated. A man of a different faith dies a victim of despair when the family of the woman he loves rejects his plea to marry her because he is an “infidel.” Many confront the noxious ‘twin towers of tyranny,’ Catholicism and the social strictures of the times.

But, but, but: the evil of racism pervades this book like an entire character we are not able to separate ourselves from. The writing is so strong on this that I would say the author conveys its insidious nature as powerfully as books such as The Known World, Washington Black, or Percival Everett’s recent James.

The writing is exquisite. It is poetic and lyrical and elegant. An early fragment caught my immediate attention: As two young men wake up in a barn being attacked by vicious dogs protecting a moonshiner’s operation, one sees “out of one pocket a vision in flight, a glint of gold in the early light” as he spies a gold cufflink, a gift from his father, come out of his pants as they are ripped apart by the dogs. Now, not only is that sentence a gem standing alone, but it’s beautiful to think that the man would notice this as his hand was being torn open by a dog’s teeth. The book, and the writing, is so perfect that I thought that the only thing that could make that sentence more perfect, in a book so wonderfully American, was if the vision had been ‘a glimmer of gold in the dawn’s early light.’

At the same time, the writing shows so much hilarious understatement that parts are laugh-out-loud funny. In all, the writing displays the same great joy and excitement that drive these characters into our hearts and memories as such grand examples of how proud, loving, graceful, and courageous people created the early stages of American life in the 20thcentury.

I loved these people. Hard working, joyous, happy, horny as hell, attuned to the beautiful sensations of music and written and spoken word, bedeviled by the social plagues of racism and religious intolerance yet striving forever onward toward a more socially just universe, I loved living with these people in this wonderful tribute to a society where I always felt that the bitter tang of life is ever-present, but that better days are always ahead.

-Andrew Solberg

• Louisville Courier (Louisville, KY) - June 17, 2025: 9 books to add to your 2025 summer reading list by Maggie Menderski
  “The author shares the joy and sadness, artistry, devotion and entrepreneurship of her ancestors while elevating them as grand examples of love and courage in the early 20th century.”

• The State Journal (Frankfort, KY) July 10, 2025: Gabrielle Gray releases first novel
  “Kentucky author Gabrielle Gray, a native of Somerset, is attracting uncommon praise and notice for her first novel, To Each the Other Sent."

• Commonwealth Journal (Somerset, KY) - July 26, 2025: A Medley of Days Past By Chris Harris