Jackson author Taylor Kitchings will sign copies of and read from his new young adults book, “Yard War,” at Turnrow Books on Tuesday.
Kitchings’ debut novel — based on his own childhood experience — is about a harmless game of football that spirals out of control.
“Yard War” focuses on a group of boys confronting racism in Mississippi in the 1960s. A white kid, Trip Westbrook, tosses a ball around with the maid’s black son, Dee, and it throws the whole suburban town for a loop.
Trip discovers the ugly side of his smiling neighbors. Even his grandparents don’t approve. Getting to know Dee, playing football and being part of a team, however, changes Trip.
The book is personal to Kitchings, having grown up in Jackson during this period when desegregation laws had been passed across America but were not yet complied with in Mississippi.
“I thought it would be interesting to take my real-life situation as an 8-year-old trying to play football with a black kid and put it in the hands of a protagonist four years older and twice as willful,” said Kitchings.
“Yard War” tackles themes as significant as race and class, and presents an absence of clear-cut miscreants and heroes. Instead, “Yard War” is a truer representation of life past and present, since many of the characters are conflicted.
“Mississippi is so complex and mysterious, I think you have to grow up here to understand it at all — I don’t claim to understand it, I just know it’s essential to me,” Kitchings said.
Kitchings resides in Ridgeland with his wife, Beth, and their children. He teaches English at St. Andrew’s Episcopal School. He also has published a short story “Mr. Pinky Gone Fishin” in the collection “Tight Lines” from Yale Press.
“Yard War” was selected as a Junior Library Guild Selection and a Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance 2015 Summer Okra Pick. For more information about Kitchings, visit www.taylorkitchings.com.
