Allegheny Front

by Matthew Neill Null, Lydia Millet (Introduction)

Set in the author's homeland of West Virginia, this panoramic collection of stories traces the people and animals who live in precarious balance in the mountains of Appalachia over a span of two hundred years, in a disappearing rural world. With omniscient narration, rich detail, and lyrical prose, Matthew Neill Null brings his landscape and characters vividly to life.

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction, Nature, Southern, Adult Fiction

192 pages, Paperback

First published May 10, 2016

About the author

Matthew Neill Null is a writer from West Virginia, a graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, and a winner of the O. Henry Award, the Mary McCarthy Prize, and the Joseph Brodsky Rome Prize from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He is author of the novel HONEY FROM THE LION and the story collection ALLEGHENY FRONT.

Reviews

[Richard Derus · Rating 5 out of 5]

This review has moved to Expendable Mudge Muses Aloud so you'll see the whole story-by-story glory of it.

Plus it's NOW $1.99 ON KINDLE so romp on over there for a great Saturday afternoon's stuck-to-the-sofa read.

[Tom · Rating 5 out of 5]

When I was a grad student, I taught a course in creative writing. The first day I had the students write me a letter about their writing experience. One fellow, a freshman, wrote, "I like to go for the guts!" I spent the the better part of the semester trying to persuade him that in fiction the relationship between viscera and a visceral response in the reader is a tricky one. Not necessarily inverse, but not quite complementary either. Regardless, he kept drenching his prose in blood, sweat, tears, and screams. (I think I gave him a "B" for enthusiasm.) If I had that student now, I would give him Null's outstanding story collection as a model for what I meant. In particular, I would direct him to the story, "Natural Resources":

"They called it the poor man's safari. A woman drove there with her children. She wanted a picture of her youngest with a bear; she wanted the child to graze the mystery, as people lift babies from the throng and lean to the president's drifting touch. She took the boy, smeared his hand in honey, and put him out there so sweetness could be licked from his fingers. Moans and nervous laughter from the cars. She had her camera ready. Two bears came loping.

The Department of Health and Human Resources absorbed three children, the county fenced off the dump, the good times were over. And they say this was once home to the happiest bears on earth. 'Not only are they giving us their toddlers, they're dipping them in honey first.'"

Need I say more?

One learns from the masters, and Null is well on his way to becoming a master story-teller, if he's not already there.

[Josh · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is what a short story collection should be. Varied, gritty, unpredictable, concise, clever, and heavily rooted in place. Clearly written by someone "from there"- much like Silas House can write of somewhere, in full disclosure, without demeaning the parts others would leverage in purely stereotypical ways. Except this West Virginia is much rawer than Silas House's version of Kentucky (not to say it is, but it's certainly written that way).

Favorites were "Gauley Season", "The Island in the Gorge of the Great River", and "The Slow Lean of Time". There's not a weak one in the bunch. Would remind you of a tougher version of Ron Rash's best short stories. If you like this, also try "Volt" by Alan Heathcock and vise versa.

[lucky little cat · Rating 4 out of 5]

These stories are grim, authentic, elegant, spare. They will stay with you: I belatedly (one page in) recognized one that was previously published three years ago. I'd read it once, recalled it vividly, and now that I've read it twice it'll undoubtedly be with me for a lifetime. Totally worth it for writing this good. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to find someone who loves me and get him to hold me. Now.

5 hours, 183 w/m

[Electra · Rating 4 out of 5]

Je viens de finir cette lecture. J’ai douté au début avec les deux premières nouvelles (sur le thème uniquement, le style est magnifique) puis peu à peu l’auteur a pris un angle différent. J’espère pouvoir rédiger une chronique qui est fidèle au livre !

[H R Koelling · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such an amazing collection of short stories. Some of the best fiction I've read in a very long time.

The author's inclusion of, and appreciation for, our natural surroundings breathed an extra dimension of life into these stories. There aren't many authors, outside of those who write exclusively about their interactions with nature, who can so seamlessly weave the behaviors and pervasive presence of animals, birds, and fish so effortlessly and beautifully into a character's narrative experience like tufts of flowers punctuating an endless horizon of rolling green fields.

These stories also introduce us to the lives of a nearly forgotten and overlooked American microcosm: Rural West Virginians. Neill Null traverses the history of these people with an insider's view of their past and current struggles and successes.

This is a true treasure of great American fiction that should be read by anyone interested in hearing the voice of a gifted contemporary author bridging the tradition of all the venerable fiction writers preceding him.

The general public will probably never know Matthew Neill Null's name, but for anyone seeking the modern voice of great American literature, it speaks from the pages of Allegheny Front.

[Marisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another short story collection that blew me away this year. VERY gritty and displayed much of what I dislike about people. This is rugged terrain and men kill one another but they kill animals more. Don't let that turn you away, though. Well, maybe it might. Lidia Millet's introduction to the book sums up the collection perfectly. Read it. If you are still turned off, then fine. But I bet her exquisite words will make you want to turn the page and venture into this world.

*Also, I can't express enough how relevant these stories are right now. I'm talking the great divide of people we just witnessed in November. I didn't (want to) see it, but somehow Null did when this was published earlier this year.

[📚Linda Blake · Rating 4 out of 5]

The stories in Allegheny Front provide an intimate view into what it means to be a male in Appalachia. The traditions, the connections, the terrain of masculinity are examined with a certain amount of tension in each story. For these reasons the stories made me think that had Breece Pancake still been alive, he could have written them. Unique to Null though is the powerful writing used to describe the role of animals in Appalachian life.

[Courtney Brown · Rating 5 out of 5]

A near perfect collection.

[Robert Morgan Fisher · Rating 5 out of 5]

Definitely in the Top 3 Grit Lit short story collections.

[Jim · Rating 2 out of 5]

DNF, and surprisingly so... i enjoyed Null's 'Honey From The Lion' immensely, but he is hardly the first author to succeed at the novel and fail at the short story for me (i find that short stories are much harder to master than the novel, less room for error and less space to display and fine tune one's talents)... i think the short story crushes Null's depth, as it lacks the space for him to develop and elucidate and describe... he seems to know his subjects well, but for me he tries to put too much into these stories, too much detail, too much characterization, too much of basically everything that makes his novel so amazing... the stories feel heavy and overdone, i feel Null isn't able to parse out what he knows so well and just give us pieces and parts that are well-fleshed, individual items to savor... the tales end up tropey, which is not a positive term for me, as every bit of minutiae is so over the top quintessentially apt to the nth degree is comes across as overtrying and "hey, look at me!" and unnecessary... look forward to his next full-length offering even so...

[Will · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although I've spent precious little time in West Virginia, these stories gave me an appreciation for its condition in the early 21st century. Modern industry and land use have destroyed the natural habitat for many native creatures, and in the process disrupted the traditional ways of life for people in the region, which included farming, hunting, and fishing. The demise of mining and manufacturing has now left many of those people without meaningful employment, consigning them to low-end service jobs and poverty. Despite the book's unflinching presentation of these often bleak prospects, it is enjoyable and compelling to read. I consumed it easily in a weekend. The author's love for his home state, its people, and its animals is evident and his writing is masterful. I plan to read his novel.

[Dave · Rating 2 out of 5]

West Virginia is trendy now. I thought that there was too much detail and trying too hard to be real West Virginia, it got in the way of the story. The stories and characters are good, but they could be cut in half and be more powerful.

[Kassandra · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best new short fiction writers of the last few years now has a collection out. Deep, dark, Appalachian Gothic.

[Jenna · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved it. Really well written. It reminded me why I love the Allegheny Mountains and short stories so much.

[Rick · Rating 3 out of 5]

The wild wild West Virginia.
Bears, birds and bumpkin bravado.
All fine writ in mountain style.

[Patrick · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read this!

[Peter Allum · Rating 2 out of 5]

West Virginia-based short stories of mixed quality, some failing to ring true.

Null writes about his native West Virginia with a keen eye for its natural richness--black bears, bald eagles, brook trout, and a huge range of plant life specific to the Allegheny mountains. His work has a strong ecological undercurrent, with streams devoid of life as a result of mine tailings and bear populations thinned by over-hunting. Null presents a range of West Virginian characters: hand-to-mouth Allegheny farmers, hunters, whitewater rafting guides, and conservation-minded scientists. Often, his writing contrasts the old Allegheny ways with modernizing influences, both for good and bad.

This 2016 short story collection follows a debut novel, Honey From the Lion (2015), and the number of awards garnered by Null suggests that he has made a strong start to his writing career. That said, Allegheny Front has a scattershot feel, as if Null's various early works had been combined, regardless of coherence. The opening story, Something You Can't Live Without, set in the mid-1800s, features a sly travelling salesman trying to persuade a farmer and his sons to buy a "new and improved" horse-drawn plough. Thinking he can hoodwink what he sees as rural hicks, he is found out and suffers harsh consequences. A strong start to the collection, this story was originally published in The Best of the South (2010).

Thereafter, the stories are weaker, and I put the collection aside after reading five of nine. The third is more like a six-page essay than a short story, tracing the near extinction of bears in Tuscarora County due to overly lax hunting rules. The fourth and fifth are more conventional stories but suffer from a lack of plausibility that undermines the reader's necessary faith in the author.

The fourth story centers on Kelly, a former miner who has found a new living running a whitewater rafting operation. When one of his rafts capsizes and a girl is lost downstream, Kelly is distraught:

"Her name's Amanda," Kelly cried. It was sudden, like the fury of a wasp.
Everyone turned to him. Hunter took his arm and tried to lead him aside.
"I know all my clients," Kelly said. He liked calling them by their names....

Kelly's claim to know all his clients motivates his distress and is critical to the subsequent path of the story. However, in my experience with whitewater outfits, rafters come from a hundred-mile radius for the excitement of a day on the river and each day brings a new group. Small groups combine to form larger rafting teams, and often rafters do not know the names of those who ride with them. The idea that Kelly can "know all his clients" is just implausible.

Similarly, when Kelly becomes suicidal, returning each night to a high bridge over the river, Null introduces three nearby Army Corp dam operators who "had a pool going as to when Kelly's lifeless body would finally wash up." Thus, a page later:

"There he is!" an engineer cried. "You win, Sully! He jumped! He finally jumped!"
The others ran out of the powerhouse. He adjusted the parallax of his binoculars in a gloved fist.
"Shit. False alarm." What he thought was Kelly was a dead deer twisted--twisting--in sunken willows."

This is a gratuitous episode which adds little to the storyline even while straining the reader's credulity about the likelihood that a group of engineers will callously welcome someone's suicide. Perhaps this is just me, but it feels like a misjudged effort to pad the story with high drama.

The fifth story, about student field researchers butting heads with local campers (who they suspect of stealing from them), rests on an improbable coincidence for its plot highlight, while containing some particularly contrived dialogue:

"I'm pissed. I buy good tools. The best. Consumer Reports and everything."
Katheryn says, "Just let it go. Don't be the world's youngest fussy old man."
As soon as she says that, Gary softens, cools, as bland as candle wax. She hates that about him."

By this point, what seemed like a good find in a secondhand book store no longer seemed worth the effort of further reading. Interestingly, despite being a signed copy, the previous owner also passed it on.

[Brett Beach · Rating 5 out of 5]

In Allegheny Front, Matthew Neill Null’s first story collection and the winner of the Mary McCarthy Prize in Short Fiction, the author returns to the West Virginia territory he mined so beautifully in his thrilling first novel, Honey from the Lion. “The bolderfields, the spaces empty of people—a lonesomeness city-dwellers could never comprehend,” he writes of the setting. “Sometimes it seems you know animals more intimately than people.” In these nine stories, Null continues the work he began in his first book of unpacking the complicated relationship between man and the natural world. He approaches from alternately sympathetic, adversarial, and prophetic angles the slippery morality that arises when people are forced into the roles of predator and prey. All the while, Null adeptly evokes the West Virginia landscape, both as it is and as it used to be—“The Allegheny Mountains . . . were a series of blue lines on the horizon. This was long before the forests were scoured off the mountains and the coal chipped from their bellies, before blight withered the chestnut stands.” Prodigious in vision, and lushly evocative, Allegheny Front will undoubtedly solidify Matthew Neill Null’s reputation as one of the most ecologically and morally conscious writers working in fiction today.

Naturally, Null’s preferred landscape is the outside world; in the most literal sense, few of the stories take place inside homes or businesses. However, the stories also represent a system in which the primary values of education and wealth are held in contrast to the hardscrabble and often violent truths of rural life. The collection’s opening story, “Something You Can’t Live Without,” takes place on a farm at the base of the Alleghenies. Cartwright, a travelling salesman, has been sent to the farm of McBride. The salesman has been assured that McBride is a “sucker”—a gullible man who will buy into the salesman’s pitch for The Miracle Blade. This ingenious, modern marvel gives the story its name, and will, Cartwright promises, be the answer to the farmer’s problems. Null chronicles the negotiations between the two men. The narrative begins to feel like a horror story as ominous details unfold; for example, McBride’s creepy twin sons, who are catalysts for the story’s climax. Suffice it say that a cave and a gun are involved. But Null wisely concludes the story with a sweeping summary of the future of McBride’s land over the next hundred years that puts into perspective the insignificance of individual lives: “Trees can reclaim fields, maps can burn, courthouse deeds can be painted in the wondrous colors of mold.”

Set in the present day, “Telemetry” concerns Kathryn, a grad-school researcher who is camping out with her two male colleagues on the banks of Shavers Fork of the Cheat River. In this remote spot, the only other people are a seemingly homeless father and daughter living in a nearby tent. The researchers suspect the girl of stealing, but forgive her for a life she cannot control. In contrast, they view the reclusive father with wariness, and suspect him of misdeeds. Though born and raised in the area, Kathryn now identifies more with her colleagues than the father and daughter. When she and her colleagues take an assumptive and condescending attitude toward the man, and accuse him of dumping bleach into the river, she is not surprised by her betrayal: Kathryn’s education is an uncommon privilege, and a means to escape the Alleghenies.

The rise and fall of black bears in Tuscarora County is charted in “Natural Resources”—a brief but impactful piece of narrative exposition rich with details, evocative of Peter Orner’s work. Without dialogue or named characters, Null jauntily recounts how the bears were first protected by the state legislature and given a sanctuary. But soon, the bears are impinging on the town: racing across the road, or rummaging through the town dump as the citizens and their children watch. Fearful that the bears are too comfortable, the citizens reintroduce hunting to the area—first in controlled percentages, though pressure from the Bear Hunters Association establishes a virtual open season. The black bear population is decimated. Soon the bears have again become legend; dogs and rocks are mistaken for the creatures that once so richly populated the land. To Null’s great credit, the reader’s primary pathos lands with the wild black bears, so the story becomes a chilling indictment of predatory hunting practices. Nothing really changes, the story suggests. If man can dominate nature, he will.

This theme of combat between man and the outside world arises again and again, as in “Gauley Season” when a young woman and her father are killed in a rafting incident. Though the flipped raft tosses the two into the water, their bodies are swept away by the merciless force of the river. (The irony, as Null notes, is that the water’s power is a product of a man-made dam.)

“Mates” follows Sull Mercer, who shoots and kills a bald eagle. This is an illegal practice, as Sull’s best friend, who also happens to be a game warden, reminds him. Compounding Sull’s trouble, the bird’s mate refuses to vacate the land, and the eagle’s constant presence overhead haunts the man: “Once again, the mate banked against the ridgeline, gliding back in his direction, gliding effortlessly, like she could do it forever.”

“Mates” and other stories are concerned with the consequences of action. In “The Island in the Gorge of the Great River” a young man’s obsession with a girl quarantined on a tiny island with other victims of an unnamed illness leads to the eventual spread of the disease to his family, and the young man’s lifelong flight from his home. Following the drowning deaths in “Gauley Season,” the story’s collective narrators witness the downfall of the rafting expedition’s leader, a charismatic young man named Kelly. As the years pass, Kelly is nearly crippled by guilt. The story’s inclusion in The Best American Mystery Stories 2014 is not an undue honor, though the story does not initially reveal itself as a mystery. Here, the influence of masters of the past—Faulkner, Flannery O’Connor, Peter Taylor—can be felt again and again. Null, too, understands better than most writers how people act out of a combination of pride, vanity, greed, lust, and love—even when these emotions remain unknown to the characters themselves.

Last year, when I enthusiastically reviewed Null’s book, Honey from the Lion, I noted that no first novel had any right to be this good. Even as these stories tread the same landscape as the novel, which chronicled the Cheat River Paper & Pulp logging company at the turn of the 20th century, the collection broadens the author’s canvas—traversing larger swaths of time, switching tones and moods from the laconic to the humorous and the horrifying. To the cast of loggers and timber wolves of his novel, Null now adds researchers, lawyers, salesmen, deadbeats, game wardens, and farmers. Few authors can so impressively give language to the often unspoken friendships of men, or invest such emotional weight to hunting or manual labor. In his clear affection for the land and the people of West Virginia, Null allows his characters a vocabulary both elegant and rough. I’ll revise my earlier statement to say that stories this good only make sense in light of a writer this good. What a pleasure to revisit this stretch of landscape. What a joy to once more have Matthew Neill Null as our guide.


Originally published in The Master's Review: (https://mastersreview.com/book-review...)

[The Cannibal · Rating 3 out of 5]

Décidément, je suis abonnée aux nouvelles, ces derniers jours !

Allez hop, direction l'Amérique et un de ces petits endroits que l'on pourrait qualifier de "trou du cul des États-unis", j'ai nommé les Appalaches.

Ah, Trumpinette vient de twitter que j'étais devenue persona non grata sur le territoire pour ce que je venais de dire. Quand on parle de trou du cul…

Anybref, ces différentes nouvelles illustrent bien l'état d'esprit de ces coins reculés et certaines de ces histoires m'ont touchées, les pires étant celles parlant de chasse…

Putain, mais quel gâchis ! Et dire que nous sommes une espèce dite évoluée… L'évolution n'a pas eu cours chez tout le monde car là, on est en pleine régression de l'être humain.

Bizarrement, si des nouvelles m'ont emportées, émotionnées (6/9), quelques-unes ne m'ont pas apporté le plaisir attendu (3/9).

Majoritairement, j'ai pris mon pied, mais la descente est assez raide lorsque l'on passe du trip absolu à une nouvelle qui nous laisse froide.

Pour certaines nouvelles, on se croirait sur des rapides, on est sur des rapides, on a eu une montée d'adrénaline et puis boum, on se retrouve en canot, à la piscine communale avant de repartir, violemment, dans la nouvelle suivante.

Toutes tournent autour de la nature, de l'eau, de la rivière, de la ruralité, des animaux vivants dans ces espaces et de l'Homme qui est capable de tout détruire.

La plume de l'auteur est trempée dans le vitriol, les histoires sont âpres, comme les personnages qui gravitent dans les histoires. du rural noir en somme.

PS : Mes préférées resteront "Quelque chose d'indispensable", "Le couple", "Ressources naturelles", "La saison de la Gauley", "L'île au milieu de la grande rivière" et "La lente bascule du temps".

[John Tipper · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection of short stories with mostly environmental themes. Null writes about man vs nature, and how man tries to dominate. One story, Mates, has an avid hunter who owns a farm. He considers himself a mountaineer, the last of dying breed. After a successful deer hunt, he notices a bald eagle soaring. He believes it has been killing his chickens, so he shoots the bird down. He then hangs the carcass up on his barn to scare other raptors. The eagle's mate comes and flies overhead, upset over the kill. Friends of the farmer inform him that killing eagles is against the law; they are protected, and he could pay a fine or face jail time. One says he must take the dead bird down, but the farmer is combative at first. Finally, he does what his DNR friend says. There's an experimental story about black bears in West Virginia. It's something of an essay on how they were protected by law, then they made a comeback in population. So open season was allowed. And the bear population declined once again. No characters or dialogue are in the piece of writing. Other writers come to mind: Eudora Welty and Flannery O'Connor. A prose stylist, Null composes some fine sentences.

[Cyndi · Rating 4 out of 5]

I give this a 4 because I recognize that it is fantastic writing but I'm adding the caveat that the subject matter is not my usual cup of tea. It's out of my comfort zone, a really powerful read, but it took me three months to get through this 165 page book. This is a - for lack of a better descriptor - mountain manly collection of short stories. It's about bear hunting, and log running, and mining, pioneers, and hard living people in gritty settings. It's also about nature and female scientists and slightly wicked little children who illustrate that mankind is born far inferior to the magnitude of the natural world. It made me really hate humans on behalf of Mother Nature for a while, at least. The time period of the stories spans a few centuries. A strange little book, but it will stick with me for a while.

[Brett Starr · Rating 5 out of 5]

A book that has been on my "to read" list for awhile. Finally sat down with it & I was very impressed.

All 9 stories in "Allegheny Front" take place outside & involve animals; natural and human. These stories involve nature, rivers, disease, hunting, logging.

This collection of stories is very well written & researched. The stories range from 4 pgs in length, several are 20 pgs in length, with the longest being 32 pgs.

My favorites included -

Something You Cant Live Without
Telemetry
The Slow Lean of Time
In the Second District

Highly recommend collection for short story fans.

Seek out good books & enjoy!

BJ

[Ron Matsu · Rating 4 out of 5]

Powerful!

A different world compared to the northeast cities where acts of violence and mayhem are common but not like this. Murder is not necessarily premeditated but a consequence of "nature's way". Life here is hard but no one says it's hard. No one explains actions as a consequence of certain behaviours it's just the way it is. Sometimes amusing sometimes brutal but hard to stop reading throughout.

[Jody Sperling · Rating 4 out of 5]

The logging story, the bear story, and the other bear story with the murderer were all amazing works of art. "In the Second District" is unforgettable. The tone of that story is different than each story in the book with crisp clean lines and vivid imagery. The narrator felt so personal and so real.

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked this book. The stories were all well told, from various time periods, and from a lesser known area of West Virginia.

The author has an amazing imagination to create this number, and variety of stories. Many are dark just know that.

[Allison · Rating 2 out of 5]

1.5 stars. I just couldn’t get into the stories.

[Jerry · Rating 5 out of 5]

As an Appalachian son of Western Maryland, I especially loved this book and recognized many of the locations which were very near home.

[Straw · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good set of short stories about West Virginny.

[Leanne McElroy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was buying books written by some of my college professors as a way to support them. This is the first one I picked up so far.

Very minor spoilers:

This book was a pleasant surprise. The Professor always gives pretty good wisdom in class so it was a no-brainer that this book was chocked full of tiny clever surprises.

That first story with Cartwright, Something you can't live without, while initially a tad confusing (before I got used to the style of the writing) sucked me in by the first couple of pages. Continuing throughout, the stories made me happily mad, shocked, and horrified, but I was still joyful that I was reading a book by a very capable writer. The third story called Natural Resources, made me so happy even though there was a subtle sadness at the same time, which is incredibly hard to pull off by the way. It was hilarious to read (I laughed out loud several times) and the bears were so cute and yet honest in their animalistic behavior which the author brought to life through their interactions with humans. I couldn't help but be like, hmm this is a real banger, and yet surprisingly short! I think those two short stories were my favorite. There was also a subtle commentary on tourism, environmental destruction, and human ignorance throughout this book, which intrigued me and made me want to keep reading.

From a craft perspective, there was so much playing around with form that I was so entranced by the multiple tools and ways in which the author experimented with language. You can tell the author took painstaking amounts of time to get this right. He was able to convey things just by the use of word connotation, association, and smart symbolism in the right places. The characters were multilayered, realistic, and felt like real people. The world was alive and had so much detail. Even in the very sad stories, I still found myself laughing out loud a couple of times at certain lines and paragraphs, almost to the point of tears because I was so enjoying the little bits of humor so much.

The cover really fits this collection. It grew on me as I read the stories. At first, I was like, mmmh okay, an eye. But now it makes so much sense and I’m not sure any other design would have done the book justice. It’s also very aesthetically pleasing to the eye (ha) and I was like ah, I ‘see’ what the design team did here. The layout, texture, and artwork were quite stunning.

I also really picked up on the Christian themes in this piece, handled with respect and nuance. It was realistic and charming. The writer got me hooked when I happily found all the scriptures and ideas that I knew by heart, even some religious references or ideas that I didn't know about. So I learned even more!

However, for me, it wasn’t five stars as much as I really wanted to give it that. This was due to a few small reasons. While the prose is exceptional, it was hard to understand at certain points. Once I re-read certain sentences I understood what was being said, but it pulled me out of the stories a few times due to a lack of clarity on what was going on.

Two of the stories in this book, while still very well written, for some reason felt estranged from the rest of the fantastic ones. These two just were foreign to me, as I kept wondering what the point of them was. The very last one, in the Second District, made me kind of frustrated because I was like okay, why does this matter? It felt too long. I understood some of the details and the point but I just didn’t feel invested in that story or characters as much as the rest in the book for some reason. The shortest one too, called the rocking stone. The only thing I took away from it is that you shouldn't cry wolf? I was like, hmm, I’m not sure this gripped my attention like I wanted it to, even though I appreciated the short length and the beautiful prose/details.

While I absolutely loved and adored, "Something you can't live without," I thought it was genius, I have one critique. At the end of this short story, I was able to pick up on the subtle imagery and allegories just fine. I wish it had ended with Cartwright’s death and the wrap-up of the farmer and his two sons. Instead, we have the woman at the end spelling out Cartwright's fate when it was clear from the subtle details what happened to him. It was satisfying at first to figure it out myself based on context but then my intrigue was deflated when I felt my hard-earned work in thinking out his fate was just told to me at the end. It felt slightly too on the nose.

Overall, wow! I was expecting to be bored learning about West Virginia but not at all, even though I'm not a native of that state, I learned so much and was so engaged for the majority of the book. You can see the love and the craftsmanship that went into this collection, and also how much knowledge the author has on the landscape and environmental details that he employs.

It may not be for everyone but I think it's worth giving a chance. I'm happy I did!