Clay Reynolds

Another library sale find that's been sitting on my shelf since last year, Clay Reynolds' THE TENTMAKER (2002), is a character-driven post-civil War western set on the mostly barren flats of west Texas. The title character, one Gilbert Hooley, is an unwilling veteran of the winning side, who has returned to his pre-war trade of tent-making, traveling west from Saint Louis, hoping to ply his trade in the mining fields of Colorado. His wagon breaks down near a spring-fed stream on the west show more Texas prairie, and there he remains, joining forces with Mino, an immigrant carpenter who speaks no English. Aided by Heinz, a foul-mouthed freighter who hauls in supplies, the town of Hoolian begins to take shape. A steady stream of colorful characters drift into their makeshift tent city - a seedy US Marshal, a band of Texas Rangers, a crew of rambunctious and horny cowboys from a nearby ranch, a fiery redheaded beauty named Margot, who imports a group of women to work in her whorehouse and bar, all constructed by Mino and Hooley. A general store is opened by one of the cowboys, tamed by marriage and fatherhood. Over a three-year period, the unambitious tentmaker is, by default, pressed into service as postmaster, lawman and mayor, as his town prospers under his uneasy partnership with "Miss Margo." Meanwhile, in a parallel tale, a gang of desperate outlaws, led by a former Confederate Colonel, Jefferson Tay, is making its murderous way steadily towards Hoolian, laying waste to small settlements, outposts, trains and homesteads. The two stories converge in a horrific and fiery finish that make the long narrative worthwhile.

This is a long read, nearly 400 pages, filled with authentic dialogue, scenery and complex characters who form complicated relationships. At times I wondered where it was all going, but it kept me engaged, and in the end it all worked. I wanted to contact the author to tell him how much I enjoyed it. Sadly, I found that Reynolds, a UT Dallas writing prof, had died a couple years ago. RIP, Clay. You were one helluva good writer who could spin out a western yarn with the best of 'em. Very highly recommended.

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

Vox Populi: A Novel of Everyday Life by Clay Reynolds
Texas Review Press
978-1-933896-98-4
$22.95, 211 pgs

Vox Populi is the fifteenth book from Clay Reynolds, professor and Director of Creative Writing at the University of Texas - Dallas, and claims - right there on the cover - to be a novel. Before Vox properly begins, there is a preface from the author discussing the definition of a novel, in which Reynolds reports that the British novelist Paul Scott told him that the only definition of a show more novel that made sense to him was "a large collection of consecutively numbered pages, each containing a volume of words, bound on one side and open on the other three and generally contained by a cover." Vox is best described as a series of character studies - or situation studies - including the study of our nameless narrator who interacts with each of these characters during the course of Everyday Life.

The narrator encounters these people at the grocery store, jury duty, the car wash, the barbershop, the tax office and on the golf course, among many other everyday locales. These people are sometimes lonely or anxious or fearful; sometimes they're oblivious and arrogant and unreliable; mostly they're just trying to do their best to get through the events of any given day. They (we) are mechanics, housewives, teachers, waitresses, military servicemen and shopkeepers. There is the older, well-off white man who checks every box of privilege this country has to offer, who has never been failed or suspected by law enforcement, who must contend with the uncomfortable conclusion that the young day laborer he sits next to at jury duty knows more about how the world functions than he does.

There is the middle-aged, carefully coiffed, sensibly dressed, middle management-type woman at the car wash who has a run-in with a chihuahua belonging to a Paris Hilton wannabe. This scene would come off as just another minor annoyance in the larger scheme of things except for three words. The woman's shoes are ruined and she turns to the narrator. "I have an appointment." She looks up at me, tears welling in her eyes. "It's an interview." I don't know how the author has done it but in those three words I felt how all of this woman's hopes for her future were pinned on this interview, that unemployment was threatening her world, and that she had always believed that if you played by the rules and worked hard then all good things would be yours. She has been betrayed by the supreme indifference of the cosmos. All of that in three little words.

There is the woman who has charged into the tax office to appeal the assessment on her property who indulges herself in a pantomime of commiseration that regularly insults the couple she is pretending to listen to. This woman is so oblivious to her surroundings that she spends the time loudly complaining of the general incompetence of her Latino gardeners and maids but fails to register that the airman in fatigues who is sharing the waiting room with her is Latino. Then she tells him, "I want you to know...I support the troops." It is a nauseating, simpering display by a woman who possesses so little self-awareness that she will never understand how offensive she is. I know every one of these people; so do you.

Clay Reynolds is uncannily skilled at rendering vignettes of strangers forced to occupy the same physical space. He is an astute observer of our smallest gestures and expressions and his dialogue is spot-on, complete with malapropisms that had me laughing aloud. His physical descriptions are detailed to an impressive degree. I could picture these people standing in front of me, to the last vivid detail. At the beginning of Vox, the nameless but not-quite-anonymous narrator seems to be a rather dull blank slate with no personality of his own and at the mercy of the seemingly stronger personalities surrounding him. As the sketches progress, though, our narrator begins to slowly but surely engage more substantively, confidently and empathetically - which is to say, successfully. It is a subtle performance.

If you prefer books that have a plot and include action to any degree then you will want to pass on Vox. Ole Willie wrote that all the world's a stage and we are merely players. We are also, basically, ambulatory sounding boards - mirrors - whose purpose is to reflect others back at themselves. Each of us would necessarily have a unique filter interfering with that reflection. Do we choose companions based on the self we prefer to see reflected back at us? If so, does that preference change over time? Do our filters change as well? If these are the sort of questions you could spend an afternoon pondering, if you appreciate a great writing exercise, if you are fascinated by the human zoo, then you will enjoy Vox Populi.

I'm going to close with a quote from "Neighbors."

Even though it seems that many of my observations about this benighted family are tinged with an odd combination of approbation and disgust, I have absolutely no problem living next door to them. On the whole, they're solicitous and cause me no direct problems. I've had worse neighbors in my time, and for all their oddity, they pose no threat to my welfare, health or happiness.

That strikes me as a pretty good litmus test for neighbors, friends and family. It is so easy to be kind to each other. Why are we so bad at it? show less

This is a great and funny and poetic collection of personal essays about all sorts of topics ranging from “macho” topics (like trout fishing, golf, baseball, etc) to pop culture (Elvis, first dates, coffee, warning labels) to personal reflections about the legacy of long lost relatives. This is the perfect gift book for the I-Know-How-To-Read-But-I’d-never-be-caught-dead-reading-Proust-or-Faulkner-or-Morrison type of reader.

Reynolds (1949-2022) is one of the most erudite authors in show more USA. His fiction is distinguished and very Texas-focused. This essay collection contains a little bit of that regionalism and some of that erudition (although Reynolds hides it very well here). Reynolds has written lots of literary essays and book reviews, but judging from this book, you'd never know it. These are more like personal incidental essays. I guess it's sort of tragic that Reynolds didn't write more in this genre; he came to the personal essay genre later in life (and didn't have time to release more).

Don't be fooled by the lack of reviews (blame the publisher for that!) This collection is sure to be a classic. show less