As Nora Thurston made her home in Florida, and as the novel is set in Florida, we examined critical biographical information about the author's role in the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s and 30s. While most of the artists associated with the Harlem Renaissance believed the role of the movement was to dispel racial stereotypes , Thurston depicted scenes and people she had known as was often criticized for her failure to directly confront racism in her writing . We traced Thurston's rise to fame and tragic end living in a welfare home in Ft. Pierce with not even enough money in her estate to provide for a tombstone. I discussed the role of the oral story telling tradition in African-American literature and the shifting point of views in the novel. Further, we noted the powerful use of figurative language even in the first paragraphs of the novel, reminiscent of the poetry of Langston Hughes, another famed author of the Harlem Renaissance. For homework, I assigned reading chapters 2 and 3.