APPALACHIAN RAGE and other Hill Country Stories

by Cab McLarty

Based on the author’s lifetime in East Tennessee and Kentucky, these stories neither over-romanticize the people as noble stalwarts struggling to maintain their culture in the face of overwhelming odds nor stereotype them as shotgun toting, banjo picking, ignorant hillbillies. The stories are of real folks who are at once caring, ambitious, desperate, loving, violent, and creative. They are of a people often battling themselves as much as they are the constraints of power, religion, and culture with which they live. All but the last story fall under the rubric of creative nonfiction although there are variations among the accounts in how much has been created. The first three, APPALACHIAN RAGE, COAL AND BRASS BEDS, and THE SELLING OF BOBBIE JO, are written as close to how the actual events and conversations occurred as memory allows. The situation, setting, and occurrences depicted in DADDY PREACHES AT THE HOLINESS CHURCH are factual with the exception of those described in the last two paragraphs. The events, though, happened to several different individuals and not to members of one family. FIT FOR A BABY is a true story, known but not directly experienced by the author. The conversations to which he was not privy have been fictionalized as have the biographies of the main characters. In WISPS, the emotional angst, the personal turmoil, the desperation of all involved, and the outcome are all real. The conversations expressing these and details of specific events were hidden behind familial walls of secrecy and shame and are, by necessity, fictionalized. The plot and the ending of PIERCING OAK RIDGE NATIONAL LABORATORIES are fiction. The primary characters, the geographical setting, the historical events and many of the interactions described are true.

Genres: Nonfiction

98 pages, Kindle Edition

First published March 30, 2013

Reviews

[Richard Croner · Rating 5 out of 5]

I grew up in southern Ohio and in my first job out of college I worked for P&G and sold package soap thru-out central Kentucky. The people excellently described in this book were the people I did business with on a daily basis. Open, caring, up-front and brutally honest. Their value system was different than the one I was raised with, but I grew to appreciate their humanity. I found this book disturbing but very enlightening. In today's world being empathetic to other individuals perceptions and feelings is something that I feel every individual should strive to enhance. This book could be a fine first step. Read it.

[Rosie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wasn't what I thought, but better

I thought by the title it would be a book about hillbilly life, tales of moonshine making stories told in an Appalachian humorous style that would leave me laughing and crossing my legs all the way to the toilet. Instead it was a book of stories that we can all relate to, even if by observations of people around us as we go about our little daily lives. Stories that doesn't make you life but rather stay with you long after the it's read. Makes you think deeper and more thoroughly about the world we live in.

[Laurie Durbin · Rating 5 out of 5]

I remember such.

I was born in the Appalachian mountains in Kentucky and know people outside of them won't be able to understand the ways of mountain folk. Life there was and is hard but you're too busy to worry about it. This book shows the true mountain life. It's ability to tell the stories without bias or pity and with the simple truths of life there is a refreshing change and much appreciated by this mountain woman

[Sioux · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good Reasons to Be Pissed Off

This is a beautifully, cleanly, elegantly written book. It is the kind of book that has made me want to explore --unsuccessfully-- Appalachia for hollers and places locals actually live. The author gives the reader clear insights into how he sees lives lived in that beautiful, poverty-stricken part of America. I wish this book were longer.

[Craig Issod · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bravo - this author is extremely talented and I can only lament that there is not a lot more work similar to this. Maybe it's better that way?

Having lived in WV and TN during my "back to the land" days of youth, I could totally identify with the stories presented. Whether fictional or not, these are all real - including the nuclear pollution!

[Ronda Wian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Folklore

Always enjoyed stories from the mountains of eastern United States . Much to learn from these mountain stories. So enjoyed this book too.

[sherri k overdorf · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thought provoking

The stories capture the range of human emotion in a subtle but powerful way. These are stories that will stay with me for a long time.

[mzbeastle · Rating 5 out of 5]

I finished this book fully two months ago, and yet, I have mental flashes of scenes, situations, dialog - and sometimes just a shadow of the feelings/emotions I experienced while reading this book.

With no prior expectations, except perhaps thinking this might be a humorous glimpse of life in far-away Appalachia, I was totally floored after just the first story. "Floored" is perhaps not strong enough.

As the stories continued to unwind and buffet my (previously unrecognized) pre-conceived notions of life in Kentucky, I was gripped - wait, that's not accurate...how about STRANGLED?...by the intensity and purity of the presentation. Just...so solidly written, so poignant, so blunt, so memorable.

This book, and its author, deserve huge kudos for presenting to the reading audience, commonplace situations not often recognized nor discussed by the population outside of the Appalachian area, with the tragedy and strength and even resignation displayed by the characters in the book.

I hope this work gets more attention, because this book, in my opinion, has the same strength as writings a century ago by Upton Sinclair. Some may think this an offbeat opinion, but I experienced the same chill of emotion reading "The Jungle" as I did reading this. Doesn't happen often in my reading experience.

Thanks to the author for providing a welcome change from my usual reading fare, and for opening my mind up to situations much more serious, and much more deserving of attention, than the latest Twitter trend.