“As always, Myra McLarey’s vivid novels take the reader to the very grit and fabric of how Southerners—black and white—navigate life and death faced with a tangled history and a confined, shared, space.” 

Michael Meltsner, Distinguished Professor of Law, Northeastern; author of The Making of a Civil Rights Lawyer and Mosaic: Who Paid For The Bullet. 

“This book represents the journey of many untold truths but especially ignites the heart of humanity. What will you do with what you’ve read? This is the question for me. Life teaches you more than most books but this book teaches you more about life. Remarkable read. Write on, my sister…write on!” 

Louis Upkins, entrepreneur, consultant, author of Treat Me Like a Customer

“Myra McLarey is a matchless storyteller. Nowhere is this uncanny skill more evident than in her The Last Will and Testament of Rosetta Sugars Tramble. In this magnificent novel, McLarey carefully brings to life characters and their experiences in a way that illustrates the complexity of the South, past and present. Intrinsic to the text are the South’s racial challenges, struggles with class and stratification and the themes of human interaction that transcend time and place that are often too painful and elusive to capture by ordinary writers. The Last Will and Testament of Rosetta Sugars Tramble is a must read at a time like this in our country as we grapple with the management of intercultural tensions—the voices, the characters and their conundrums resonate with all thinking people.”

David Whitfield, Director of Community Engagement and Inclusion: The Ensworth School 

“The Last Will and Testament of Rosetta Sugars Tramble by Myra McLarey has everything you want in a good read: memorable and, for the most part, endearing characters, ironic twists of plot, and narration that captures the almost hypnotic cadence of the Southern dialects. Most of all, it has lessons as relevant today as they were in 1815, when the story begins.” 

Elizabeth Hayden, Retired English Department Chair at OHCHS in S. Paris, Maine

“The Last Will and Testament of Rosetta Sugars Tramble is a beautifully written fictional biography of a family and community representing the best that fiction has to offer in terms of the ability to take us to the heart of the subject matter and challenge us to think about assumptions we have about race relations in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries. As C. Vann Woodward suggested in The Strange Career of Jim Crow and Victoria Bynum in The Free State of Jones, race relations were not necessarily so fixed in Jim Crow ideology as we have come to assume. McLarey captures the sense of possibility and hopefulness in the late nineteenth century and, appropriately, demonstrates how African American liberties were challenged by customary white assumptions. She takes us from the era of Jim Crow to a more modern generation, dating to when the post-Civil Rights movement came of age. Her later characters ride the crest of different sensibilities but also face challenges from those still clinging to those outworn sensibilities. McLarey has written a masterful work of literature, evocative of the a new generation of southern literary greats.”   

–Jeannie Whayne, author of Delta Empire, co-author of Arkansas, A Concise history. 

“The Last Will and Testament of Rosetta Sugars Tramble by Myra McLarey is an eloquently written and engaging story about the impact of systemic racism. Through the silence of Rosetta—and other strong characters who are much like members of my own family—Myra McLarey weaves a story linking a long-gone era to modern times and how events and attitudes collide and continue to form the world we live in. This is a story for everyone, especially individuals who repeatedly ask the question: ‘Why do people of color keep harping on their past history?’ Myra McLarey lets us know that the weight of silence is too heavy a burden to bear.”

Odessa Settles, singer and founder of the performing, recording, and songwriting group “The Settles Connection”

"Those of us who grew up in the same neck of the woods as Myra McLarey know very well that our ‘sleepy Southern towns’ were not nearly as sleepy as they might have seemed to casual passers-through. Amid the area’s alligators, cotton fields, cattle herds, and factory smoke stacks were people whose experiences, dreams, passions, and fears were constantly buffeted by the winds of tradition, history, race, and economic change. African-Americans, like Rosetta Sugars Tramble, the book’s heroine, find themselves often tested by fire – the fires of anger and resentment as well as physical fires that threatened their homes and institutions. Myra McLarey weaves their stories together to produce a brilliant tapestry that reflects the realities of their lives. It is a particularly relevant read at a time of heightened public discourse about whose lives “matter.” 

Damon Thompson, former UPI and The Washington Times reporter

“Myra McLarey’s The Last Will and Testament of Rosetta Sugars Tramble is the best in a series of her very good novels. The story is wonderfully gripping, told in the natural cadence of the red earth land of Southwest Arkansas, the people, the spoken language, and the historical racial tensions of the region. This is a story of the audacity, cunning, insight, ingenuity, and courage of a people forced to live under the thumb of another. The narrative is told with the authority of one who both knows and with equal awareness feels the flow of it. And while the story is regional, it is both American and universal in its DNA. It is a satisfying read, and I would suggest an essential read for anyone who would bother with the matter of knowing who we are and where we come from.” 

Brady Peterson, author of five books of poetry, including García Lorca is Somewhere in Produce

“The power of storytelling is on full display in Myra McLarey's The Last Will and Testament of Rosetta Sugars Tramble.  Embedded within beautifully written scenes are hard truths about the impact that racism can have on generations of families and powerful examples that highlight our desire to see humanity in one another.  I couldn't help but feel a warm familiarity with the characters in McLarey's novel.  I see myself in Nate Rivers and Solomon Reed. Uplifted to endless opportunities by the strength of a family that has worked tirelessly to help me thrive, moved by a deep love that was once seen as illegal, and exhausted by the perceived threat that my blackness can place in the mind of others. This story is a timely reminder that if we can learn from our past to understand our present, then we can progress towards a better future.”

Miles Asafo-Adjei, Manager, Engagement and Workplace Pro-grams: Diversity, Equity and Inclusion for HCA Healthcare

“Myra McLarey has done it again. She has written us a world so real you could almost touch Safronia's flowered handkerchief or taste the cider in Mary Virginia's cup. My heart raced with every eye-opening truth and unexpected twist. I was quickly invested as I worried about the ‘outcasts,’ celebrated with them, and was unspeakably outraged at the myriad injustices they faced. Most compelling, though, is the juxtaposition between the sweet daily details of McLarey's characters' days and the almost unimaginable threats to their very lives. I missed these folks so much that I reread the book just to visit them again. The Last Will of Rosetta Sugars Tramble is a powerful gem of a book. “

Alicia King, author of Healing: The Essential Guide to Helping Others Overcome Grief and Loss

“The Last Will and Testament of Rosetta Sugars Tramble showcases Myra McLarey’s ability to spin one of the richest and liveliest Southern sagas of contemporary times. The intimate narrative voice tells a complex and nuanced story about people for whom the past is as immediate as the present, and history itself becomes as full-blooded a character as Rosetta herself. Readers are in for a captivating journey.”

Jessica Treadway, author of Please Come Back to Me

“What a delight: full of sly, funny, salt of the earth people whom we believe in and honestly care about, and full, too, of much gloriously poetic prose, plus intriguing and conceivably true homespun lore, an abundance of Biblical quotations that add a rich depth to the tale, and the fresh, wonderful, folk expressions of Arkansas. I haven’t read anything like it since Eudora Welty last wrote.”

Ron Hansen, author of Atticus, Mariette in Ecstasy, and The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford.