In the best Southern literary tradition, A Yellow Watermelon explores poverty and racial segregation through the eyes of an innocent boy. In rural south Alabama in 1948, whites picked on one side of the cotton field and blacks on the other. Where the fields meet, twelve-year-old Ted meets Poudlum, a black boy his own age, who teaches him how to endure the hard work while they bond and go on to integrate the field. Through Poudlum and Jake, an escaped black convict, Ted learns of evil forces gathering to deprive Poudlum’s family of their property and livelihood. The white boy and the black boy encounter danger and suspense while executing a plan to save Poudlum’s family, set Jake onto a river of freedom, and discover a great, yet simple secret of enlightenment.
In Ted Dunagan's The Salvation of Miss Lucretia, young friends Ted and Poudlum continue their friendship despite the racial divide in the rural segregated South of the 1940s. On a trip to the forest where they plan to train their dogs, they stumble upon Miss Lucretia, the last of the voodoo queens. The boys fear, but later befriend Miss Lucretia, who teaches them secrets such as how to walk on fire. She also reveals that she was the granddaughter of the last slave born in Africa and brought to the United States illegally. Ted and Poudlum decide to bring Miss Lucretia out of the forest, until the arrival of Miss Lucretia's nephew, Cudjo Lewis III, who has his own selfish reasons for keeping his aunt hidden. Through a series of adventures, Ted and Poudlum resolve to follow their own unique moral compasses and do what's right despite the pressures of the time in which they live.
Ted Dunagan, named 2009 Georgia Author of the Year in the young adult category for his debut novel A Yellow Watermelon, continues the saga of two adventuresome boys in this sequel, Secret of the Satilfa. Both books are set squarely in the Southern literary tradition as they reveal the lives of young Ted and Poudlum, friends despite the racial divide in rural Alabama in the late 1940s. In the fall of 1948, Ted and Poudlum have their post-Thanksgiving fishing trip to the Cypress Hole on the Satilfa Creek interrupted by unwelcome visitors – fugitive bank robbers. They manage to escape and return to the Satilfa to search – along with seemingly half the locals – for money rumored to have been hidden by the criminals. However, Ted and Poudlum have a clue no one else possesses. Through their exposure to some memorable individuals, the boys grow in character and knowledge as they hunt for the missing treasure.