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God of River Mud: A Novel
Grappling with innate desires and LGBTQ identity, a family struggles under the oppressive expectations foisted on them by fundamentalist Christianity.
Told through alternating perspectives, God of River Mud chronicles the lives of Berna Minor, her husband, their four children, and Berna’s secret lover. To escape a life of poverty and abuse, Berna Cannaday marries Zechariah Minor, a fundamentalist Baptist preacher, and commits herself to his faith, trying to make it her own. After Zechariah takes a church beside the Elk River in rural Clay, West Virginia, Berna falls in love with someone from their congregation—Jordan, a woman who has known since childhood that he was meant to be a man. Berna keeps her secret hidden as she struggles to be the wife and mother she believes God wants her to be. Berna and Zechariah’s children struggle as well, trying to reconcile the theology they are taught at home with the fast-changing world around them. And Jordan struggles to find a community and a life that allow him both to be safely and fully himself, as Jay, and to be loved for who he is. As the decades and stories unfold, traditional evangelical Bible culture and the values of rural Appalachia clash against innate desires, LGBTQ identity, and gender orientation. Sympathies develop—sometimes unexpectedly—as the characters begin to reconcile their faith and their love. God of River Mud delves into the quandary of those marginalized and dehumanized within a religious patriarchy and grapples with the universal issues of identity, faith, love, and belonging.
Told through alternating perspectives, God of River Mud chronicles the lives of Berna Minor, her husband, their four children, and Berna’s secret lover. To escape a life of poverty and abuse, Berna Cannaday marries Zechariah Minor, a fundamentalist Baptist preacher, and commits herself to his faith, trying to make it her own. After Zechariah takes a church beside the Elk River in rural Clay, West Virginia, Berna falls in love with someone from their congregation—Jordan, a woman who has known since childhood that he was meant to be a man. Berna keeps her secret hidden as she struggles to be the wife and mother she believes God wants her to be. Berna and Zechariah’s children struggle as well, trying to reconcile the theology they are taught at home with the fast-changing world around them. And Jordan struggles to find a community and a life that allow him both to be safely and fully himself, as Jay, and to be loved for who he is. As the decades and stories unfold, traditional evangelical Bible culture and the values of rural Appalachia clash against innate desires, LGBTQ identity, and gender orientation. Sympathies develop—sometimes unexpectedly—as the characters begin to reconcile their faith and their love. God of River Mud delves into the quandary of those marginalized and dehumanized within a religious patriarchy and grapples with the universal issues of identity, faith, love, and belonging.
403 pages, Paperback
Published January 1, 2024
10 people are currently reading
68 people want to read
About the author
Vic Sizemore
4 books9 followersVic Sizemore is the author of the essay collection Goodbye, My Tribe: An Evangelical Exodus, and the short story collection I Love You I’m Leaving. His fiction and nonfiction appear in Story Quarterly, North American Review, Southern Humanities Review, storySouth, Blue Mesa Review, Sou’wester, [PANK] Magazine, Reed Magazine and many other journals. His fiction has won the New Millennium Writings Award and has been nominated for Best American Nonrequired Reading, Best of the Net, and several Pushcart Prizes.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
February 9, 2024
A fantastic work. Oh my goodness. How do I even review this? Anyone who grew up in Christian evangelicalism but didn't quite "fit" within it will likely find both relatability and triggers in this book.
Be sure to read the church bulletins at the beginning of each chapter. There's important information within them and the changes in services and songs over the years are fascinating.
This is not an easy read. There are a few racist and ableist slurs and Vic Sizemore doesn't shy away from difficult but important topics like child sex abuse. Make sure you're in a decent headspace before picking it up. I began reading this book as part of a book club (though I couldn't help but read ahead) and I have found it helpful to have other people read it at the same time and be able to read their thoughts and share my own with them as well.
Overall I found this to be a satisfying read. The characters are extremely 3-dimensional, their struggles are relatable, and they are each delightfully HUMAN in their own beautiful, tragic, and flawed ways.
Be sure to read the church bulletins at the beginning of each chapter. There's important information within them and the changes in services and songs over the years are fascinating.
This is not an easy read. There are a few racist and ableist slurs and Vic Sizemore doesn't shy away from difficult but important topics like child sex abuse. Make sure you're in a decent headspace before picking it up. I began reading this book as part of a book club (though I couldn't help but read ahead) and I have found it helpful to have other people read it at the same time and be able to read their thoughts and share my own with them as well.
Overall I found this to be a satisfying read. The characters are extremely 3-dimensional, their struggles are relatable, and they are each delightfully HUMAN in their own beautiful, tragic, and flawed ways.
January 14, 2024
I'm stunned by Sizemore's storytelling and the honest glimpse he offers into the complex inner lives and cultural landscape of his characters. The book is brutal to read at moments but there's redemption to be found in Sizemore's unflinching attention to the impact of generational trauma and shame.
The characters, while experiencing mental, emotional, and even physical brutality, are never reduced to caricatures or tropes to impose a heavy-handed moral point. Even the villains are potential victims in these stories. Sizemore allows readers to pull their own lessons from the characters' experiences, which can make for some cathartic moments and deep reflection.
Sizemore's impressive attention to detail helps him do this with seemingly little effort. Readers are invited to put pieces together with fine grain narrative detail and church bulletins that serve as character maps for each chapter. The book starts off with apparently disjointed vignettes but they come together to weave a compelling narrative.
If you grew up queer or questioning within a conservative religious environment, if you ever tried to create your own sense of identity within a close-knit rural community, if you've navigated generational poverty and trauma, or otherwise found yourself in tension with your home town or family there is probably something for you here.
But it's also a great book for those who would like to understand more about others' lives that are nothing like their own. I'm reading as someone who was raised outside the church and I'm finding it very educational. I imagine that if more people read this book, we would see increased empathy and understanding for many groups, from West Virginian evangelicals to queer suburban youth.
The characters, while experiencing mental, emotional, and even physical brutality, are never reduced to caricatures or tropes to impose a heavy-handed moral point. Even the villains are potential victims in these stories. Sizemore allows readers to pull their own lessons from the characters' experiences, which can make for some cathartic moments and deep reflection.
Sizemore's impressive attention to detail helps him do this with seemingly little effort. Readers are invited to put pieces together with fine grain narrative detail and church bulletins that serve as character maps for each chapter. The book starts off with apparently disjointed vignettes but they come together to weave a compelling narrative.
If you grew up queer or questioning within a conservative religious environment, if you ever tried to create your own sense of identity within a close-knit rural community, if you've navigated generational poverty and trauma, or otherwise found yourself in tension with your home town or family there is probably something for you here.
But it's also a great book for those who would like to understand more about others' lives that are nothing like their own. I'm reading as someone who was raised outside the church and I'm finding it very educational. I imagine that if more people read this book, we would see increased empathy and understanding for many groups, from West Virginian evangelicals to queer suburban youth.
March 15, 2024
I read this book as part of a book club, so read it two chapters at a time for the first few weeks, and then grew impatient and finished the last half in one sitting. I mulled about my thoughts on this book and still don’t know how I feel. It started off really strong, but somewhere between the last half and two thirds, kind of just petered out, with a highly predictable finish. This book can be pretty triggering to people who grew up in the deeply evangelical to borderline cult communities, LGBT people from those communities, and people who’ve been SAed.
The book is a series of vignettes of several different characters, whose lives intermingle and twist about each other. We see the characters as children, teenagers, as adults, and then their children. The book uses vivid imagery, but I feel like often times it uses more words on describing than on an actual plot. The power behind this book is held by the reader’s experiences. People who’ve grown up outside of the fundamental christian communities will not be as triggered or impacted by the radicalization from Calvinism, the noticing a freshly taped AWANA circle, or understand the nuances between various situations. It was a good book, but oddly specific about certain topics, such as listing multiple books on Calvinism but never explaining other topics. God of the River Mud glossed over the trauma of churches being torn apart by leadership who disagree on theology while fixating on what one of the characters wore. The book was written for “those in the know” and while it could be a good insight for people who grew up outside of small communities, it feels rushed and predictable.
The book is a series of vignettes of several different characters, whose lives intermingle and twist about each other. We see the characters as children, teenagers, as adults, and then their children. The book uses vivid imagery, but I feel like often times it uses more words on describing than on an actual plot. The power behind this book is held by the reader’s experiences. People who’ve grown up outside of the fundamental christian communities will not be as triggered or impacted by the radicalization from Calvinism, the noticing a freshly taped AWANA circle, or understand the nuances between various situations. It was a good book, but oddly specific about certain topics, such as listing multiple books on Calvinism but never explaining other topics. God of the River Mud glossed over the trauma of churches being torn apart by leadership who disagree on theology while fixating on what one of the characters wore. The book was written for “those in the know” and while it could be a good insight for people who grew up outside of small communities, it feels rushed and predictable.
September 5, 2024
A stunning book with interesting insights into Christian evangelism
September 2, 2025
One of my favorites!! It can be slow in some points but it’s so worth it if you love Appalachian novels like me!
October 8, 2025
Probably not one I would have picked on my own, but it was a good read. Polished it off it about 3 days.
January 23, 2024
Well written and constructed story of people far too often ill-served by entities intended to give them aid and comfort. Especially those who are outside the lines those in charge demand be the "norm". I am still thinking but that is the immediate response. Deeply affecting read, definitely.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews