Excerpt from All the Little Hopes by Leah Weiss, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

The government man is corpulent with flushed cheeks. He carries a battered briefcase and takes two steps while studying a scrap of paper. "I'm looking for David Brown," he calls out with a voice abnormally high for a heavy man.

"Is it Everett Brown or Wade Sully?" Mama's voice pinches, saying the names of my oldest brother and my sister Helen's husband.

"Oh, Lordy, ma'am." He clears his throat. "I'm sorry I scared you thinking that way, seeing this government car and all. No, ma'am. I bring good news."

Mama's body softens, and I turn curiouser.

She rings the dinner bell to call Daddy in from the tobacco field where the crop is already stunted from a dry spell this year. I come down from the loft, tuck Nancy Drew between hay bales, slip on my bee suit like I was supposed to when I wanted to read instead. I tie my sneakers and walk out of the barn in time to see the tractor chug this way on high. Grady stands on the frame, his shirt billowing in the air. When they get close, Daddy cuts the motor, and they jump down and move at a fast clip. Mama yells, "It's not our boys," so they don't race their hearts.

Daddy walks up to the stranger, sticks out his right hand mannerly, and slides his toothpick to the corner of his mouth. "I'm David Brown. My son, Grady."

Juggling the briefcase in his left arm, the good-news man wipes his right hand on his trousers before he shakes Daddy's hand, then Grady's. "I'm John T. Booker, sir, representing the United States government. Mind me asking how many hives you got there?" He nods toward the white boxes beyond the barn.

"Beehives?" Daddy was thinking bad news and is confused. He glances at me holding my bee hat in one hand and the unlit smoker in the other when it should be smoldering. I can't help that I love books with a passion and they can interrupt tending bees, but Daddy's forgiving. His eyes settle back on the fat man. "Bout a hundred, last count."

"Whew. That's a nice operation. Does that come to about a thousand pounds of beeswax and eight thousand pounds of honey a year?" Mr. Booker throws out figures I've never heard before.

"Thereabouts…" Daddy answers, but he doesn't elaborate on how often a hive absconds when the temperatures change, or the queen dies and throws the hive into a quandary, or their food source dries up in a drought like we had two summers back. It's rare to have all our hives in working order.

"I'm here to talk bee business with you, Mr. Brown."

"You want my honey?" Daddy frowns because with the war on and sugar scarce, honey is a prized commodity.

"It's mostly beeswax we need, sir. Is there somewhere we can talk? I've got a proposition for you."

Daddy nods to the table under the oak tree, where dinner is served at noon to field hands. "Here'll do."

Mr. John T. Booker brushes off twigs and leaves, sits on the bench, and plops his bulging briefcase on the table. Grady leans against the tree, chews on his toothpick, and adroitly rolls three glass marbles between his fingers. Mama sits between my little sisters, Lydia and Cora, shy on each side. I sit, too, unzipping the bee suit for ventilation. Unexpected company takes precedence over chores. My older sister, Irene, is at her newspaper job in town, but she's going to be sorry to hear a proposition secondhand. And my oldest sister, Helen, stays inside the house like she's prone to do. Mama says it's melancholy that's taken hold of Helen since she got in the family way and her husband, Wade, is fighting in the Pacific. Even a stranger coming and sitting at our table won't bring her outside.

Mr. Booker looks nervous with so many eyes aimed at him. He is a rumpled mess, rifling through his muddled papers. He pulls out a wrinkled pamphlet, irons it out with his palm, and gives it to Daddy.

"This here will explain what I come to talk about." He uses his index finger to wipe sweat off his upper lip, leans toward Mama, and speaks low. "Ma'am, can I bother you for some water? I'm mighty parched." With a tilt of her head, she sends Cora to the well to fetch a cup. Mr. Booker stares after the pale and frail of my sister who has often been mistaken for an apparition. He takes the cup from her, but his hand trembles. Still, he drinks the water and nods his thanks.

Excerpted from All the Little Hopes by Leah Weiss. Copyright © 2021 by Leah Weiss. Excerpted by permission of Sourcebooks. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.