Ron Rash

The author is a master of Appalachian settings and characters, and this novel is another gentle look at a rural locale filled with generational and income inequality struggles. It's set during the Korean War, when Jacob, the only living child of the wealthiest family in Blowing Rock, NC, meets Naomi, a young hotel maid from Tennessee and they elope, against the wishes of his resentful parents. He is conscripted and Naomi, pregnant, is forced by the pressure of his parents and the show more disapproving townspeople to return to her father's farm. Jacob's best friend Blackburn, the cemetery caretaker who is living with the aftermath of polio, does his best to care for Naomi when, in the tension-filled opening chapter, Jacob is wounded in Korea. Jacob's parents lie and meddle in Jacob and Naomi's lives, and only Blackburn is able to resist the corruption they spread through the town. The very suspenseful ending is beautifully resolved. I was convinced that Rash's skills had faltered in the last few years, but this novel restores to my best graces. show less

If you do not like ruthless, greedy and vengeful characters, you will not like the story of timber magnates Serena and George Pemberton as they are the epitome of evil to everyone and everything they touch. Set in 1929 North Carolina, they proceed to strip the land with disregard to the environment, treatment of animals or anyone who gets in their way.

Serena, so brilliantly named for the icy cool exterior that hides the smolder within, stands alongside Lady Macbeth in her evilness. My show more strongest criticism of this novel is that Rash never gives us a cause to feel for Serena—he hints only at some disaster that befell Serena as a younger woman in Colorado—so we have no idea how this exceptionally learned woman achieved her schooling or her scales. She becomes more evil as the story continues, treading a very fine line between compelling character and bad caricature.

But. Oh....! I was so caught up in, & delighted by this novel; by Rash’s sumptuous writing and his wickedly good storytelling, I would have followed him anywhere. It was sheer delight to unwrap the layers of his narrative, like a birthday present. Rachel’s gentleness and the gut-churning tension of her plight contrasts brilliantly with Serena’s rape and pillage of the Appalachian forests and her quest for absolute power. George Pemberton embodies man’s weaknesses of the flesh and heart. He tips the scales as his loyalties shift this way and that, his moral compass swinging wildly from True North.

Rash is a writer of this lonely place, his gorgeous language conveying the lore, loveliness, and dangers of Appalachia like a song. But his characters are so real...! Serena has an enormous cast, shifting, changing, fighting, dying, but each character is so clearly defined and richly-drawn that there is no mistaking their vitality or purpose to the plot. And the plot itself is irresistible. Rash creates a primal parable of greed and power, weaving in themes of environmentalism, poverty and political will, that borders on melodrama, but with such precise skill that, maybe like me, your senses are elevated to the rafters and beyond. It’s a damn good book.

The movie, though, is somewhat the same, though quite a bit was changed. I have no idea why. I just knew that when I saw Jennifer Lawrence's stellar performance with Bradley Cooper, that tons was left out, long before I'd read the book. There is a plethora of subtext that most people just didn't get, I guess, when seeing the movie, and that makes me sad. I understood, and wanted more. This novel is like the 2nd cousin of the movie; solid, strong, definitively more handsome, and a lot more intelligent. 4 stars. show less

I don't know exactly what I was expecting when I read this book -- maybe a North Country or Coal Miner's Daughter brand of feminine heroism in hill country.

But Serena is an antiheroine, as you'll discover pretty shortly after she makes her appearance. She's smart, attractive, devious, and bloodthirsty. If she has a redeeming quality, it's a fierce and intelligent ambition, but then there's a fine line between ambition and cruelty (or maybe the former fuels the latter).

In short, she's a show more fascinating character, but the real protagonist is her husband, whom she calls by his last name (and hers): Pemberton. He's a big, tough guy, unafraid of hard work and fights to the death, and seems like he and Serena might actually be a perfect (terrifying) pair.

But there's trouble in the gangstas' paradise -- can he really live up to Serena's standards of ruthlessness, or will he disappoint her by showing a sliver of compassion at exactly the wrong moment?

Ron Rash does an excellent job of leaving that question dangling in front of the reader for nearly the whole book. At every turn, I wanted to know how Pemberton was going to react, and that kept me metaphorically on the edge of my seat. Well worth a read if you enjoy complex characters, or are interested in the backgrounded-yet-highlighted tension between loggers and the nascent development of national parks. show less

I've been aware of Ron Rash for several years now as one of the foremost Southern writers of our time, and now I've finally managed to read one of his books, an early one I found in a used book store. And THE WORLD MADE STRAIGHT (2006) is, I have to tell you, one helluva ride, and presented in some of the most exquisite, poetic prose I've read in years. It is a very Southern coming of age tale, set in North Carolina, with its seventeen year-old protagonist, Travis Shelton, a high school show more dropout, who runs afoul of Carlton Toomey, a vicious local drug lord, is kicked out of his home by his tobacco farming father, and finds refuge in the rundown trailer home of Leonard Shuler, a disgraced former teacher who sells beer and pills to underage kids. Under Leonard's care and tutelage, and encouraged by a new girlfriend, Travis gradually begins to see a way out of the dead end life of gritty poverty which is so evident all around him. There is also an historical angle here, as Leonard, a very bookish type who came from a background as poor as Travis's, is studying the journals of a great-great grandfather, A doctor in the Civil War who was party to a local massacre that continues to resonate in smoldering resentment among the victims' families. And just when it seems Travis has turned his life around, one night of impulsive anger and violence brings him full circle to face the vengeful rage of Carlton Toomey, threatening to bring all of his dreams come crashing down. Indeed the last fifty-plus pages had me literally sitting up straight, on the edge of my recliner reading as fast as I could. I mean this Ron Rash really is GOOD! Fortunately I have another of his books, SERENA, waiting on my pile. (And, incidentally, both this book and SERENA have been adapted to films too.) Because now that I've finally "discovered" this guy, I know I'll definitely be seeking out his other stuff. This one gets my very highest recommendation.

- Tim Bazzett, author of the memoir, BOOKLOVER show less