The Cailiffs of Baghdad, Georgia

Stefaniak (The Turk and My Mother) delivers a deeply engaging story from the heart of 1930s-era Threestep, Ga., that manages to include stop offs in 1775 Baghdad and 1864 Savannah along the way. Loosely following the tradition of The Thousand and One Nights, which spunky Miss Spivey uses as the core curriculum in her one-room Threestep schoolhouse, the novel is full of intrigue, with babies switched at birth, the Ku Klux Klan, camels fluent in Arabic, and wish-granting genies. Told primarily from the point-of-view of 11-year-old Gladys, the tale begins with the arrival of Miss Spivey, the new teacher in town. Fascinated by the Middle East, she transforms the town into Baghdad, culminating in a bazaar that attracts Georgians from across the state. But the young teacher's progressive spirit proves threatening to some, and her vision falls prey to a tragic chain of events, giving the novel a much-needed boost. In the tradition of Scheherazade, stories are told within stories, by many tellers, creating a nesting doll of events for the young Gladys to get to the bottom of. (Sept.)