Book Spotlight Posted on September 9, 2023: https://travelingwitht.com/2023/09/09/book-spotlight-womens-fiction/

I recently read "The Last List of Miss Judith Kratt" by Andrea Bobotis and found it to be an engaging and thought-provoking read. Told from the perspective of Miss Judith, the book captures the tone of a proper southern lady from the early 20th century. The story follows Miss Judith, a 75-year-old woman, as she reminisces about her past while going through her family possessions and the return of her sister Rosemary after 60 years, which threatens to uncover family secrets.

I found her observations about sibling relationships to be captivating. The book delves into themes of loyalty, prejudice, survival, and self-identity. The author does an excellent job of depicting the time period and setting. Although I could predict some of the major plot points, it did not detract from my enjoyment of the story.

The pacing of the novel is slow and it took me a while to get fully invested in the story. However, once I was hooked, I couldn't put it down. If you find yourself struggling to get into the story at first, I recommend sticking with it.

I recommend this book to fans of southern fiction with darker themes. It would also make a great choice for book clubs, as it includes discussion questions. Overall, "The Last List of Miss Judith Kratt" is a powerful and emotional journey that explores the complexities of family, memory, and the human experience.

I received a review copy of this book from the publisher through NetGalley for my honest review. The opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own.

Though the book told an intriguing family drama I couldn't relate to the characters, especially Judith Kratt, who tells the story. Sadly, I found the narration digressing too often into little anecdotes of Judith's past I was not interested in, and so had a a hard time to keep focused on the main story-line. Sometimes, a book and its reader just don't match, which definitely was the case with this odd couple.

Andrea Bobotis's debut novel is a beautifully written story of racism and deep family secrets. “The Last List of Miss Judith Kratt” is a glorious Southern Fiction tale that many will fall in love with.. her writing is so smooth and lyrical, I love getting lost in language this way! It was hard to believe we were reading such a harsh and cruel story.
Andrea Bobotis is one to watch.
I received a copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for a fair and honest review.

I think that the students in our school library need to hear lots of diverse voices and read stories and lives of many different kinds of people and experiences. When I inherited the library it was an incredibly sanitised space with only 'school readers' and project books on 'the railways' etc. Buying in books that will appeal to the whole range of our readers with diverse voices, eclectic and fascinating subject matter, and topics that will intrigue and fascinate them was incredibly important to me.
This is a book that I think our senior readers will enjoy very much indeed - not just because it's well written with an arresting voice that will really keep them reading and about a fascinating topic - but it's also a book that doesn't feel worthy or improving, it doesn't scream 'school library and treats them like young reading adults who have the right to explore a range of modern diverse reads that will grip and intrigue them and ensure that reading isn't something that they are just forced to do for their English project - this was a solid ten out of ten for me and I'm hoping that our students are as gripped and caught up in it as I was. It was one that I stayed up far too late reading and one that I'll be recommending to the staff as well as our senior students - thank you so much for the chance to read and review; I really loved it and can't wait to discuss it with some of our seniors once they've read it too!

The Last List of Miss Judith Kratt is bit too slow for my personal tastes. Andrea Bobotis is an engaging writer, and I absolutely loved her style, but there were times where I was just ready for a quicker pace. Sometimes reading more like a character study, The Last List... does a great job of exploring characters, emotions, and development, but sometimes I just wanted the pace to pick up a bit more. Again, I do want to reiterate that Bobotis's writing is just superb, even if the story itself wasn't quite my thing.

I'm not sure what I was expecting when I picked up this book, but it was definitely not what I got. I found the story quite slow, but it kept me interested and wanting to know what happened next. I still felt I wanted more from it though.

This book is great! Would definitely recommend. Thanks so much to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

Miss Judith Kraft has spent her entire life in her family’s home, surrounded by possessions and secrets.
The first half of this book is a little slow, as you begin to learn more about Judith and her family’s history in South Carolina.
The story skips from past to present often without much warning as Judith thinks back on a specific memory.
The mystery of her brothers death is intriguing, but a lot of Judith’s memories seem a bit random in places until everything wraps up nicely at the end once all the details of the past are revealed to all characters involved.
Overall I give this book 3 stars.

My apologies but I could not get into this particular novel. It may be due to the COVID crisis and wanting to stay away from topics that are not cheerful. I'm sorry. DNF

This book reminded me just a little bit of The Hell. Which is one of my all time favorite books. It definitely makes you realize “the south” is like an entirely different world.

Wow, this book was not what I expected and I mean that in a good way. This is the story of the Kratt family and all they dealt with for several generations. It is a story of life in the south, the good and the bad. It is a story of racism, classism and how people treated one another for many years. We all have ideas of what it was like in the south as recent as the late 1900s, but Andrea Bobotis writes in such a way that you feel like you are there. You feel the heat, the bugs, see the cotton and run away to hide with those being hunted.

Miss Judith wants to make a list of all that she owns before it is her "time to go." Of course what she owns is only worth what someone else would pay for it. So, she really doesn't have a lot, but what she does have are the stories and the memories that go with each item. She also has secrets, secrets that she wants to keep close to her breast. Secrets that would harm the family name and some others. Unfortunately, when her sister, Rosemary, returns home she knows that keeping those secrets may not be as easy as she would like.

The story is a historical fiction tale of what it was like in South Carolina. The author does an amazing job with this dual timeline story, weaving the life of 80 something Judith with the past of the Kratt family, including a family murder. The descriptive writing gives us well-developed characters that we can easily picture. As the time changes, so does the way racial tensions loosen, but there are still issues to be dealt with. Although Judith was a bit strict and staid, as the story went on, I really started to like her. Amaryllis, the young girl that helped bring Judith out of herself, was wonderful. She was innocent and honest and curious which allowed Judith to share stories with her and then with us, the reader. This was an absorbing, all encompassing read. I did not stop reading until the last page. I loved this book and recommend it to anyone, especially those who love family sagas, good southern literature, mysteries, human drama and human rights issues.

Have you ever cleaned out a garage of family heirlooms and shared all the stories that go alongside them? The Last List of Miss Judith Kratt by Andrea Bobotis is told from the perspective of Judith Kratt as she reflects on her life.
It’s a story of family secrets, abuse of power, small towns, racism, murder and trying to do the right thing.
It started out slow but it had a steady build towards the end. Judith was abrasive, aloof and a hard character to like but had moments of redemption. Most of the characters were hard to like except for one.
Overall, the book was slow but I enjoyed the second half.

Trigger warnings for a sexual abuse scene of minor.

Thank you Netgalley, SOURCEBOOKS Landmark and Andrea Bobotis for free e-ARC in return of my honest review.

Miss Judith Kratt is sitting on her veranda and reminiscing about her long life at this small South Carolina cotton town where once her family owned everything it was worth to own. Her father, Daddy Kratt, was a prosperous businessman with a huge network of slaves. He was determined to earn more and more money as there was never enough. In this wealth race, Daddy Kratt did not pay much attention to his own family. However, one simple mid-step and it all went down. Adultery, race relationship, murder, bravery and cowardness are all in one.

Judith starts her childhood house (where she’d lived all her life) inventory. Some of the objects stir her memory and she goes through her family history. At the same time, another story is unraveled in the present. Her character has a lot of depth to it. I couldn’t say if I liked her or not from chapter to chapter. I had mixed feelings. She did betray some people and was selfish in her decisions, but who could blame 11-year-old girl?

Plot-wise, I think it was too overwhelmed with the past and the present. It was all interconnected and well described but I personally felt it was too crowded. I had hard time to connect to both timelines.

Splendid look at a very different period of time. Judith's forays into memory lane, the resolution with her sister, all is done pretty well.

I originally could not get into this book as the dramas unfolded very slowly. But this is dark Southern writing and I knew it would get me there. I loved the imagery and the story as it came together.

I was invested in the characters. Judith's words were just wonderful and told such an overwhelming story. I did feel there were many loose ends that didn't get tied and I was left with questions .

I loved the list. It was changing as memories came and that was just so unique, nothing I have seen before or since reading this. 4 big stars.

3,5 Stars.

One late afternoon of 1989, Miss Judith Kratt was suddenly taken by the idea of making an inventory of her family heirlooms. With this inventory, the story and tragedy of her family was told after more than 60 years of silence.
In the 1920s, Judith’s family, the Kratts, were practically royalty in the small town Bound; taking control of the cotton production and almost running the town until a tragedy strikes.

I liked how the story was told; Judith Kratt remembering the different events leading to the tragedy through different pieces of furniture, the heirlooms of her family. I liked also the fact that those events were connected and affected the present and the people around her. I’m not sure, though, that I liked Judith Kratt herself. She was a bit snob after all.
Overall it was an enjoyable and a bit touching story.

"The Last List of Miss Judith Kratt" brings us a story about the wealth and the rise of the Kratt family, as well as its downfall. When Judith decides to make a list of her family's valuable assets, one can hardly imagine all the memories and traumas they will bring with them.


The story runs at a slow pace and introduces us to the minds of a small conservative town and its inhibitants. It is also subtly filled with the racial and property issues that fit the basic idea of ​​this book.

Some of the main objections to the novel would be that the individual events that form the backbone of the action are presented as completely passive and almost dull, with none tension effect whatsoever. And while such a choice is perfectly suited at the ending, it is definitely problematic for the rest of the novel.

I'm partial to books that look back reflectively on a person's life so this way a good pick for me. I grew very fond of Miss Judith Kratt and enjoyed the interaction between her and Olva. The southern setting was very well drawn. There was a great sense of place. My only criticism was that I found the the pace a bit plodding, especially in the beginning of the book. It was one of those books, that once put down, did not beckon to me to pick back up. Of course that changed as we moved along in the story and the climax turned out to be a heart pounder.