SECRETS OF SHADY
The Story
Secrets of Shady is a cinematic journey into the heart of the Chitlin’ Circuit—the network of Black-owned clubs that nurtured generations of performers when segregation closed most doors. At its center is Shady Henson, a gifted singer with a velvet voice and a guarded past. Onstage she commands the room; offstage she walks a tightrope of love and danger, ambition and sacrifice. As Shady travels from juke joint to juke joint, she discovers that the music that carries her can also cost her everything. Guided (and sometimes haunted) by voices like Aunt
Blending historical fiction with the pulse of blues, gospel, and soul, the novel brings to life a rarely told chapter of American culture. It is a story about women’s artistry and endurance, about family legacies and buried truths, and about the communities that made room for joy even when the world did not. With lyrical prose and vivid, performance-ready scenes, Secrets of Shady invites readers behind the curtain—into the dressing rooms, boarding houses, and midnight highways where art is born and secrets refuse to stay silent.
Sugar’s hard-won wisdom and Lizzie’s watchful presence, Shady must decide what she will run from, what she will run toward, and what she will finally lay down.
