Demon Copperhead

by Barbara Kingsolver

My first day back, walking into the lunchroom: heads turn, trays clatter, everybody stands up clapping. Lunch ladies in hairnets are clapping. Most of me is thinking: They don’t know me. Free lunch kid.

Demon clinging so tenaciously to this thread rings less true with each chapter. The insights and intelligence Kingsolver have given him make it very hard to believe he'd still be pushing this line. She should've made him less observant and perspicacious or should've worked harder to explain why he'd cling so hard to this self image. As it is, his rigidly compartmentalized wisdom never extending to his sense of self reads less and less true.

Trust the road. Because nobody stays, in the long run you’re on your own with your ghosts. You’re the ship, they’re the bottle.