The Twelve Tribes of Hattie by Ayana Mathis: review They seem to exist in a bubble, divorced from everything but their own tragedy. And boy is there a lot of tragedy: alcoholism, racism, infidelity, war, mental illness, suppressed homosexuality, a disfiguring childhood accident, ruinous gambling and near-death from tuberculosis, all within 250 pages. Yet it fails to move. Occasionally, Mathis's matter-of-fact treatment is spot on as when she captures the animal fear of Hattie's sister, Pearl, threatened by a group of rednecks in the segregated South. One of the men stepped closer to Pearl. Her bowels dropped. More often, it is plodding. The sexually confused, trumpet-playing Floyd has invited a young man to his concert: "Lafayette was not in the club. Floyd told himself it wasn't the boy's arrival he was waiting for. Still, it was not until Lafayette slipped into the crowd that Floyd lifted the horn to his lips. These blunt sentences hit the reader over the head. It's as though Mathis doesn't trust us to work it out for ourselves. There may be a good writer in Mathis, but she hasn't got her groove yet. The Twelve Tribes of Hattie Ayana Mathis Hutchinson, £12.99, 256pp