Missing May by Cynthia Rylant

First published: 1992

Subjects: Death, family, and friendship

Type of work: Novel

Type of plot: Psychological realism

Time of work: The late twentieth century

Recommended Ages: 10-13

Locale: A small mountain town in West Virginia

Principal Characters:

• Summer, an orphan passed from relative to relative until Aunt May and Uncle Ob claim her for their own
• Uncle Ob, Summer’s devoted uncle, who has been devastated by the sudden loss of his wife
• Aunt May, Summer’s aunt, whose loving presence is still felt
• Cletus Underwood, Summer’s classmate and an inveterate collector
• Mr. Underwood, and
• Mrs. Underwood, Cletus’ parents

Form and Content

As Missing May opens, twelve-year-old Summer recounts the events leading to her adoption by Aunt May and Uncle Ob: the death of her mother and being passed from house to house among her relatives in Ohio. Summer feels unwanted, “caged and begging,” until May and Ob visit from West Virginia when Summer is six years old and recognize her yearning to be loved. They return with her to their rundown trailer deep in the Allegheny Mountains of West Virginia, where Summer realizes that she has come home. Although they are poor, May and Ob give Summer what she needs most: love, comfort, and acceptance.

May dies suddenly in her garden, however, when Summer is twelve, and, although Ob continues to love and care for Summer, both are lost without May. Six months later, Ob suddenly “feels” May’s spirit still hovering near them. Desperately wanting to speak once more with May, Ob calls on Cletus Underwood, Summer’s classmate. Because Cletus almost drowned when he was seven, Ob believes that he has a special connection to the spirit world and is a conduit through which May can contact them. When they are unable to communicate with May, Ob quickly falls into a deep depression, for the first time not waking on time to get Summer off to school. He confesses to Summer that he doubts he can continue to go on without May.

Cletus provides an unexpected pathway to salvation for all of them through his collection of pictures. He brings Ob a newspaper clipping about the Reverend Young, a spiritualist pastor who communicates with the dead. The coincidence that she is sometimes called the Bat Lady and that May was fond of bats seems strong evidence to Summer, Ob, and Cletus that they should seek her help in contacting May’s spirit.

Summer and Ob visit the Underwoods’ house to get permission for Cletus to travel with them to visit the Reverend Young. When they arrive, Summer sees Cletus in a new light. Instead of the odd, insecure boy she had known from school, Cletus seems self-assured and comfortable, and Summer realizes it is because of the love and support that his parents give him. She feels ashamed of the disgust that she previously felt for Cletus.

When the three pass through the city of Charleston on their way to visit the spiritualist, Cletus is awed by their proximity to the state capitol, and Ob promises that they will tour the building after they have consulted the medium. Upon discovering, however, that the Reverend Young has died, Ob loses all hope. Summer aches for both of them, knowing that Ob is too depressed to help Cletus realize his dream of visiting the capitol. Ob, however, has a sudden change of heart, turns the car around, and drives back to the capitol building. The three lunch among the legislators in the capitol coffee shop and then tour the capitol, where Cletus is enthralled. They leave Charleston with lighter hearts because of Ob’s renewed sense of purpose.

When they reach home that night, an owl flies over Summer’s head, bringing back poignantly the loss of May. She finally releases the tears that she has been unable to shed. The next morning, the three of them fill May’s empty garden with Ob’s “whirligigs,” finally setting both her spirit and themselves free.

Critical Context

Cynthia Rylant has earned a coveted place in juvenile and young adult literature by fearlessly tackling difficult topics and by adding to her readers’ knowledge of Appalachia. It is easy to feel Rylant’s love of her childhood home in her Caldecott Honor Books When I Was Young in the Mountains (1982) and The Relatives Came (1985), but it is particularly in her young adult novels such as Missing May, A Fine White Dust (1986), and A Blue-Eyed Daisy (1985) that the Appalachian setting adds dimension to the problems of her central characters. Although the ordinary people featured in Rylant’s novels may not perform heroic deeds, readers can relate readily to the everyday heroism that they show in facing life’s difficulties tranquilly and accepting as right one’s natural place in the world. Her young protagonists encounter problems that keep the adolescent reader riveted: the death of a loved one, a parent’s alcoholism, hero-worship and an intense religious experience, the decision of a teenager’s mother to have a baby whose father’s identity she will not share. Wondering how the problem will be resolved keeps readers enthralled, but learning that each person has a valuable place in the world provides the real satisfaction.

Rylant has written dozens of children’s and young adult works, including picture books, poetry, short stories, novels, nonfiction, and works for beginning readers. In the Newbery Medal-winning Missing May, she continues the first-person narration, clear, simple writing style, and natural language that made her earlier Newbery Honor Book, A Fine White Dust, vivid and compelling.