Evangeline of the Bayou

Balzer + Bray, 2018

ISBN-13: 978-0062680341

Available: Hardcover, Kindle edition, audiobook

While the supernatural Southern Gothic tradition and Louisiana setting are well-known in adult and YA fiction, I have never come across a supernatural Southern Gothic middle-grade novel like Evangeline of the Bayou,  that so beautifully evokes the wilderness of bayou country, so that it is almost a character itself ( I was reminded of Carl Hiaasen’s descriptions of the Everglades in Scat and the descriptions of the swamps of  Texas in Kathi Appelt’s Keeper and The Underneath,  also middle-grade novels, but otherwise these are very different kinds of books).

Eleven-year-old Evangeline Clement lives in the bayou with her grandmother. Evangeline is the last in a long line of  “haunt huntresses”, women with the power and skill to defeat the supernatural creatures of the bayou, and is anxiously waiting to come into her powers and meet her familiar, which must happen by the time she turns 12. Her disastrous attempts to overcome supernatural creatures on her own suggest that she’s not quite ready to operate independently, though. When her grandmother volunteers to help with a supernatural problem in New Orleans, Evangeline, as her apprentice and assistant, accompanies her to the Midsomer family’s luxurious mansion to try to discover what might be ailing the beautiful Mrs. Midsomer. At the Midsomers’, Evangeline encounters Camille, the solicitous housekeeper; Julian Midsomer, the maddening, bluntly honest, routine-bound son of her hosts; the skeptical Mr. Midsomer; the distressed Mrs. Midsomer, who is running out of time; and Laurent Andreas, leader of the exclusive krewe to which Mr. Midsomer belongs. She is not impressed with the trappings of wealth, and her inner commentary on it is great, but she has a good heart and genuinely wants to help.

When Evangeline’s grandmother breaks her leg just before things are about to go out of control, it is up to Evangeline, unwillingly accompanied by an unbelieving Julian, to stop things before it’s too late.  The tension builds slowly in the Midsomers’ mansion at first, but once we’ve met all the characters, the story moves at a breakneck pace, and exposition is tied in so skillfully that you almost don’t notice. As dark as the story gets (and it gets pretty dark) it still has moments of humor, and strongly demonstrates the power of love and self-sacrifice. There are certainly some outrageously unbelievable moments; for instance, Evangeline’s grandmother is far more resilient than anyone could possibly expect from an ordinary human being. In a story populated with banshees and revenants, though, I’m willing to cut Eldredge a little slack.

Author Jan Eldredge avoids writing in dialect, which I think works fine for this book, but the names of the creatures Evangeline encounters are so unusual that I didn’t realize that the supernatural creatures in the book are all grounded in Cajun folklore until I reached the glossary at the end (searching the Internet for more information on these creatures was a challenge, and there were many I couldn’t find). As a native of Louisiana, perhaps it didn’t occur to Eldredge that children interested in monsters and cryptids who are not from the area would have trouble tracking additional information down.

While Evangeline, the bayou, and the supernatural creatures of Louisiana are the most convincing characters in this book, as far as I can tell, it is unique in its combination of genres in middle-grade fiction. Try it with kids who are interested in ghost stories, cryptids, supernatural creatures, monsters and monster hunters, books set in the American South, and American folklore. This book has an audience out there, just waiting to find it. Recommended.

Contains: Violence, murder, death in childbirth, blood