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The Woods of Fannin County
In the fall of 1945, eight children, all brothers and sisters, vanished from a small rental house in Morganton, Georgia. The oldest was ten and the youngest was a newborn. They were taken by mule and wagon to a shack on a remote mountain in the Blue Ridge foothills of Fannin County, up where it hugs the North Carolina line. For the next four years they would live mostly alone, without mother or father, roaming the mountains and valleys of what had been Cherokee Territory, scouring for food and scrambling to take care of themselves and each other.
Few people ever knew what happened. Over time the children themselves became silent about their childhood, and their story was buried.
One day in 2015 the children, long grown and many of them now grandparents, began to reveal the story to Janisse Ray, award-winning author of the bestselling memoir, Ecology of a Cracker Childhood . The Woods family wove a sometimes painful, sometimes jubilant, and always astounding revelation of their subsistence in an Appalachian wilderness. Had that not happened, this remarkable story of abandonment, survival, and the incredible resilience of eight children might have been forever lost.
Janisse Ray is known for her literary nonfiction, characterized by rich lyricism, knowledge of the natural world, and sincere embrace of the ecology of the heart. Based on a true story, The Woods of Fannin County is Ray’s first novel.
Few people ever knew what happened. Over time the children themselves became silent about their childhood, and their story was buried.
One day in 2015 the children, long grown and many of them now grandparents, began to reveal the story to Janisse Ray, award-winning author of the bestselling memoir, Ecology of a Cracker Childhood . The Woods family wove a sometimes painful, sometimes jubilant, and always astounding revelation of their subsistence in an Appalachian wilderness. Had that not happened, this remarkable story of abandonment, survival, and the incredible resilience of eight children might have been forever lost.
Janisse Ray is known for her literary nonfiction, characterized by rich lyricism, knowledge of the natural world, and sincere embrace of the ecology of the heart. Based on a true story, The Woods of Fannin County is Ray’s first novel.
207 pages, Paperback
Published July 21, 2022
81 people are currently reading
594 people want to read
About the author
Janisse Ray
42 books276 followersis an award-winning and beloved American writer. Her work encourages wild, place-centric, sustainable lives and often calls attention to heart-breaking degradations of the natural world.
She writes the popular Substack TRACKLESS WILD, tracklesswild.substack.com.
Her newsletter for writers, SPIRAL-BOUND, janisseray.substack.com.
She is a sought-after and highly praised teacher of writing. She leads both in-person and online writing workshops, including a summer memoir course online, WRITE YOUR OWN STORY.
You can find more information about workshops and courses at her website.
https://janisseray.com/product-catego...
Check out her book CRAFT & CURRENT: A MANUAL FOR MAGICAL WRITING.
Janisse has won an American Book Award, Pushcart Prize, Southern Bookseller Award, Southern Environmental Law Center Writing Award, Nautilus Award, and Eisenberg Award, among many others.
Her collection of essays, WILD SPECTACLE, won the Donald L. Jordan Prize for Literary Excellence.
Her books have been translated into Turkish, French, and Italian.
Janisse's first book, ECOLOGY OF A CRACKER CHILDHOOD, recounts her experiences growing up in a junkyard, the daughter of a poor, white, fundamentalist Christian family. The book interweaves family history and memoir with natural history—specifically, descriptions of the ecology of the vanishing longleaf pine forests that once blanketed the Southern coastal plains.
ECOLOGY was followed by many other books, mostly creative nonfiction--often nature writing-- as well as poetry and fiction.
She earned an MFA from the University of Montana, has received two honorary doctorates, and was inducted into the Georgia Writers Hall of Fame. She has been awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award by the Georgia Writer's Association.
She lives on an organic farm inland from Savannah, Georgia, where she enjoys wildflowers, dark chocolate, and the blues.
She writes the popular Substack TRACKLESS WILD, tracklesswild.substack.com.
Her newsletter for writers, SPIRAL-BOUND, janisseray.substack.com.
She is a sought-after and highly praised teacher of writing. She leads both in-person and online writing workshops, including a summer memoir course online, WRITE YOUR OWN STORY.
You can find more information about workshops and courses at her website.
https://janisseray.com/product-catego...
Check out her book CRAFT & CURRENT: A MANUAL FOR MAGICAL WRITING.
Janisse has won an American Book Award, Pushcart Prize, Southern Bookseller Award, Southern Environmental Law Center Writing Award, Nautilus Award, and Eisenberg Award, among many others.
Her collection of essays, WILD SPECTACLE, won the Donald L. Jordan Prize for Literary Excellence.
Her books have been translated into Turkish, French, and Italian.
Janisse's first book, ECOLOGY OF A CRACKER CHILDHOOD, recounts her experiences growing up in a junkyard, the daughter of a poor, white, fundamentalist Christian family. The book interweaves family history and memoir with natural history—specifically, descriptions of the ecology of the vanishing longleaf pine forests that once blanketed the Southern coastal plains.
ECOLOGY was followed by many other books, mostly creative nonfiction--often nature writing-- as well as poetry and fiction.
She earned an MFA from the University of Montana, has received two honorary doctorates, and was inducted into the Georgia Writers Hall of Fame. She has been awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award by the Georgia Writer's Association.
She lives on an organic farm inland from Savannah, Georgia, where she enjoys wildflowers, dark chocolate, and the blues.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 125 reviews
November 19, 2023
''Why do they want to put us off up here? Bobby said.
God works in mysterious ways, Hiram said
What does that mean?
Git along the best you can, I guess.’’
Based on a true story, The Woods of Fannin County is a gripping tale that’s difficult to fathom. In 1945, eight children (the eldest being 10 at the time) were taken on a wagon to a remote shack in the Blue Ridge foothills of Fannin County, and left to fend for themselves. Their mother just left them there. Occasionally she would return to check on them and bring them food and clothes, but there was no pattern to this. Often she bullied the children when she returned to the shack. What’s worse is that her parents encouraged her to do it, and the community chose to turn a blind eye. It’s heart-breaking.
What unfurls is an extraordinary tale of survival and kinship amongst the siblings. They forage for food, learn how to light fires, they learn to steal. They were left in the shack for 4 years until they were rescued.
The truly remarkable thing is that they all survived and went on live fairly 'normal' lives afterwards. Janisse Ray heard about their story from her father, then spend 10 years researching and speaking to the surviving children, before writing (and self publishing) the book.
Beautifully written with sparse dialogue, it takes on some tough themes. It's a difficult story to tell, but it's an important one that will stay with you for a very, very long time.
God works in mysterious ways, Hiram said
What does that mean?
Git along the best you can, I guess.’’
Based on a true story, The Woods of Fannin County is a gripping tale that’s difficult to fathom. In 1945, eight children (the eldest being 10 at the time) were taken on a wagon to a remote shack in the Blue Ridge foothills of Fannin County, and left to fend for themselves. Their mother just left them there. Occasionally she would return to check on them and bring them food and clothes, but there was no pattern to this. Often she bullied the children when she returned to the shack. What’s worse is that her parents encouraged her to do it, and the community chose to turn a blind eye. It’s heart-breaking.
What unfurls is an extraordinary tale of survival and kinship amongst the siblings. They forage for food, learn how to light fires, they learn to steal. They were left in the shack for 4 years until they were rescued.
The truly remarkable thing is that they all survived and went on live fairly 'normal' lives afterwards. Janisse Ray heard about their story from her father, then spend 10 years researching and speaking to the surviving children, before writing (and self publishing) the book.
Beautifully written with sparse dialogue, it takes on some tough themes. It's a difficult story to tell, but it's an important one that will stay with you for a very, very long time.
January 23, 2023
Janisse Ray is one of my favorite nonfiction/nature authors. But even so, I hesitated about reading this book, her first fictional work. It is very closely based on a true story and a difficult one to read about.
In the 1940s, 8 young children, ranging in ages from a year to 11 years old, were taken by their mother and grandfather up to a nearby mountain shack and semi-abandoned for 3 years. At first the mother would return weekly with food but as time went on her visits got more infrequent and she grew very abusive to the children, particularly to the daughter whose looks reminded her of the husband who had left her. Ruby, it seems, was in an ongoing affair with the county sheriff and didn't want the children and neither did the grandparents. The story is outlined in the preface with Janisse Ray talking about how it came to written so no spoilers here.
It is both a story of the children's survival (cooking hominy on an open fire, gathering firewood, finding ramps, poke sallet, berries, apples, etc.) and their struggles with guilt and shame over not being wanted and what happened during those three years. As adults, the siblings buried the memories of their time in the mountains and only as they were aging did they begin to talk about it among themselves and eventually want the story told. It isn't just a story of the failure of parents and family but also of community -- local people knew these children were alone on the mountain but the tradition of not interfering in "family business" was very strong then.
I finished this book several days ago but I am still thinking about it. I marvel, too, that the siblings all did survive and led productive lives, with families of their own, without turning to alcohol or abuse themselves.
It's not a long book and it is told in almost a documentary style, half way between fiction and recording of fact. I miss the lyrical quality of Janisse Ray's nature writing in this but it is an important story and I think she found the best way to share it through fiction.
In the 1940s, 8 young children, ranging in ages from a year to 11 years old, were taken by their mother and grandfather up to a nearby mountain shack and semi-abandoned for 3 years. At first the mother would return weekly with food but as time went on her visits got more infrequent and she grew very abusive to the children, particularly to the daughter whose looks reminded her of the husband who had left her. Ruby, it seems, was in an ongoing affair with the county sheriff and didn't want the children and neither did the grandparents. The story is outlined in the preface with Janisse Ray talking about how it came to written so no spoilers here.
It is both a story of the children's survival (cooking hominy on an open fire, gathering firewood, finding ramps, poke sallet, berries, apples, etc.) and their struggles with guilt and shame over not being wanted and what happened during those three years. As adults, the siblings buried the memories of their time in the mountains and only as they were aging did they begin to talk about it among themselves and eventually want the story told. It isn't just a story of the failure of parents and family but also of community -- local people knew these children were alone on the mountain but the tradition of not interfering in "family business" was very strong then.
I finished this book several days ago but I am still thinking about it. I marvel, too, that the siblings all did survive and led productive lives, with families of their own, without turning to alcohol or abuse themselves.
It's not a long book and it is told in almost a documentary style, half way between fiction and recording of fact. I miss the lyrical quality of Janisse Ray's nature writing in this but it is an important story and I think she found the best way to share it through fiction.
September 23, 2022
I really liked this story which reached my heart. I am very close to many people who have shuffled through foster homes and yes that small hard rock like a hickory nut in their gut and soul always remains. Stories like these of Appalachia and or foster families must be captured. Thank you Janisse Ray for courageously stepping out of your eco-mode to write some fiction. Super clean content and inspiring for self-publishers too.
November 6, 2022
A true story that needed to be told. Thanks Janisse.
October 27, 2022
This is a self-published novel by a highly-acclaimed author. That doesn't happen every day. But Janisse Ray has expressed in interviews her frustration with the current book publishing market. She has nothing to lose, really, by publishing her own book. I was attracted to this title because I have read Ray's work, including Ecology of a Cracker Childhood. She is a fine writer. I also was interested in this book because I am very familiar with Fannin County, Georgia, where my family had a vacation home for about fifty years.
This is a heartbreaking story, especially considering that it is based on the lives of real children and their hardships due to abandonment by their mother and father and extended family. Left to fend for themselves at such a young age, it is almost unbelievable that this could have happened in the 20th century and in an area of the country that is not exactly sparsely populated.
There is nothing wrong with the writing whatsoever, with the possibility that there isn't enough of it for a story of such magnitude. Ray should have either decided to stick to a limited set of facts and write an article about these children (perhaps she tried but couldn't find a publisher?), or she should have settled in and wrote a novel that filled in way too many of the existing gaps of time, character development, and plot, which would have made this a much better book.
This is a heartbreaking story, especially considering that it is based on the lives of real children and their hardships due to abandonment by their mother and father and extended family. Left to fend for themselves at such a young age, it is almost unbelievable that this could have happened in the 20th century and in an area of the country that is not exactly sparsely populated.
There is nothing wrong with the writing whatsoever, with the possibility that there isn't enough of it for a story of such magnitude. Ray should have either decided to stick to a limited set of facts and write an article about these children (perhaps she tried but couldn't find a publisher?), or she should have settled in and wrote a novel that filled in way too many of the existing gaps of time, character development, and plot, which would have made this a much better book.
October 13, 2022
Fans of Janisse Ray, having read her stellar works of nonfiction, have begged for this transition to fiction. We know she has a magical way of sprinkling readers with stardust and luring us into her wooded-world where she then opens our eyes to the truth. In this debut novel, Janisse once again takes us to the woods she loves, painting vivid pictures of remarkable children who survived an unimaginable ordeal. We are with them at every turn of this novel.
This novel will grab you by your heart and refuse to let go. In this testament of love beyond compare our eyes are open to childhood trauma and the lengths one travels to survive.
Well done!
This novel will grab you by your heart and refuse to let go. In this testament of love beyond compare our eyes are open to childhood trauma and the lengths one travels to survive.
Well done!
September 27, 2022
Pitch perfect, zero fat economy in this naturalist treatment of a occurrence wrought by humans on members, the young, of their own species of southern Appalachia. Ray is a genius at every genre or discipline to which she turns her deft hand.
September 16, 2022
Short, I was able to finish it in a day. But very intriguing and sad. Will look at the other books by the author.
September 26, 2022
I read this book one afternoon, could not put it down. Such a heartbreaking story, very well told.
December 22, 2022
Impossible to put down and at the same time difficult to digest as the book is based on a true story. It was hard to read as a mother, but there was so much beauty in the writing.
Ray is able to transform tragedy into poetry and ugliness into beauty.
Ray is able to transform tragedy into poetry and ugliness into beauty.
Read
September 13, 2022You'll hate this book. Read it anyway. You'll sob. Read it anyway. You'll have fits of anger. Read it anyway. While Janisse Ray moves us deeply into the lives of eight children abandoned in the Georgia Mountains and their quest for survival, she also urges us to explore our connection with the natural world, and how we can grow into kinder, more resilient people. Clearly this is a book Ray had to write, and clearly it is a book I needed to read. Note: I can't seem to clarify that I read the paperback version of the book, not the Kindle version.
September 12, 2022
How they survived.
This was a simply written but profound book. I couldn't put it down. The two oldest children took charge to the best of their abilities and forged a life for their six younger siblings for four years on a mountain top....with literally no resources for most of the time. Why no one came to their rescue is reprehensible. Their parents never suffered any consequences for their appalling abuse and neglect.
This was a simply written but profound book. I couldn't put it down. The two oldest children took charge to the best of their abilities and forged a life for their six younger siblings for four years on a mountain top....with literally no resources for most of the time. Why no one came to their rescue is reprehensible. Their parents never suffered any consequences for their appalling abuse and neglect.
September 6, 2022
A compelling story that hits too close to home for comfort, this book belongs in the curricula, the memories, and the fabric of every community in America. We must often be reminded the depths to which our apathy can take us and others. It is a sober reminder that doing nothing is indeed doing something.
May 12, 2024
This is a heartbreaking story about the resilience of eight children abandoned by family and friends to live, survive - or maybe die - in a mountain shack. The story is true, and Ray has done an amazing job of piecing it together from the reminiscences of the children as adults. She says upfront it's fiction but she certainly incorporated as many facts as she could find. It's easy to read - I finished in one day -but also hard to absorb such a sorrowful story, and even harder to understand how so-called "adults" knew about but allowed them to live in this condition.
December 30, 2023
Haiku review:
The woods are full of
Mystery, pain, apathy.
The Woods are healing
The woods are full of
Mystery, pain, apathy.
The Woods are healing
November 19, 2022
An emotional, revelatory telling of a true story that serves as a harsh reminder of the extremes of the human experience. The disgust I feel toward the heinous Ruby, Roy, Mr. Allen, America, and the community that abandoned the Woods children to fend for themselves in a ramshackle mountainside shanty, is countered by the fierce love and commitment Bobby, Glenda, and Phyl have for each other and their siblings. The only thing more amazing than their story is the fact that they survived to share it.
March 12, 2023
What a heart-breaking story, told through interspersed sections of fictionalized remembrances and the near-transcripts of present-day interviews with at least one of the grown children. For all the romanticizing of the olden days being a better time when large, extended families supported themselves and each other, the fact is the lives of children who are the product of difficult circumstances have often been under-valued, through no fault of their own.
I hope Janisse Ray writes more fiction. As much as I love her non-fiction writing, this glimpse into her expanded skill as a story-teller was most welcome.
I hope Janisse Ray writes more fiction. As much as I love her non-fiction writing, this glimpse into her expanded skill as a story-teller was most welcome.
April 6, 2023
A fictional retelling of a true story. Heartbreaking and frustrating and an incredible story of survival.
June 4, 2023
Based on a true story. 8 kids abandoned by all relatives and forced to tend for themselves in North Georgia mountains..
Good but sad.
Good but sad.
July 23, 2023
Very well written book! So sad and disturbing, but I'm glad the story was told.
February 27, 2023
I wanted to read this book since it is based on a true story. A true story that is heartbreaking, and at the same time filled with hope, love, and determination.
Being a self published book made it more interesting to me as well.
Well done.
Being a self published book made it more interesting to me as well.
Well done.
September 20, 2022
There are no words…
There are no words to describe the pain these children must have experienced. Or how a mother or grandmother or grandfather could be so heartless.
And yet became beautiful souls ❤️
There are no words to describe the pain these children must have experienced. Or how a mother or grandmother or grandfather could be so heartless.
And yet became beautiful souls ❤️
December 22, 2022
Sad story but worth the read
I was hesitant to read this book knowing it would not be a happy tale. I am glad I read it because even though the children had an extremely difficult life, they persevered. It is so difficult to understand what difficulties the children lived through when you have never lived a life of want. This book showed me that you can live through unspeakable hurts and make it to the other side, but you do not get out unscathed in some way.
I was hesitant to read this book knowing it would not be a happy tale. I am glad I read it because even though the children had an extremely difficult life, they persevered. It is so difficult to understand what difficulties the children lived through when you have never lived a life of want. This book showed me that you can live through unspeakable hurts and make it to the other side, but you do not get out unscathed in some way.
December 24, 2022
A stunning tale of survival.
A remarkable fact-based story of children abandoned and left to their own devices in the rugged North Georgia mountains in the 1940s. When the adults in their lives fail them, their family bond keeps them all alive. An excellent read.
A remarkable fact-based story of children abandoned and left to their own devices in the rugged North Georgia mountains in the 1940s. When the adults in their lives fail them, their family bond keeps them all alive. An excellent read.
September 17, 2022
Knowing that this was based on a true story made it a difficult read. Hard to imagine children, babies even, left to forage on their own.
October 21, 2022
Once again, Janisse Ray blends her knowledge of and love for nature with an emotional, raw, reflective experience that you'll forget is fiction. This is a painfully beautiful read about the human condition. And while not at all political, this novel has been published in a time when we can all use a reminder to pay attention, be compassionate, and love our neighbors.
Also of note, I love the font choice, font size, and page feel of the physical book itself.
Also of note, I love the font choice, font size, and page feel of the physical book itself.
October 4, 2022
Hauntingly sad and beautiful
Based on a true event, this story is heartbreakingly sad and yet beautiful at the same time. The resiliency of the human spirit is shown in these eight little lives that refused to be snuffed out. The ugliness of the human heart portrayed is in stark contrast to the innocence of these children still wanting, needing, and loving their parents.
Based on a true event, this story is heartbreakingly sad and yet beautiful at the same time. The resiliency of the human spirit is shown in these eight little lives that refused to be snuffed out. The ugliness of the human heart portrayed is in stark contrast to the innocence of these children still wanting, needing, and loving their parents.
October 4, 2022
Ray brings her brilliant gift of writing the natural world in vivid color to the landscape of the human heart. Even as she offers the reader a story almost too painful to imagine (and true, to boot), Ray gives voice to beauty in the midst of suffering.
October 3, 2022
The Woods of Fannin County is a gripping tale exquisitely told. Deep in the gut gripping. Why? The horror of 8 kids being dumped off in the woods--left to die by their next of kin--the purpose seemed to be to get rid of the burden of them, is just boggling--and the story is "True." That's what 8 children lived and carried forever forward. This really took place and now truth has been unearthed from a family (and dare I say local and regional) graveyard of history where untold secrets of gigantic proportions, of cruelty and complicity endured and survived, usually remain out of sight. The miracle of this book is that some of the children who lived this story came together in adult years to tell what happened. They told it to an author who was ready to dive deeply with them into the years of truth buried. And, in the reading I lived it with them, breath by breath and experienced healing in tandem with them.
A great boon for me was the incredible local dialect utilized throughout the telling. I was in another world...of croker sacks, poke salat and foot-washing Baptists. The story is exquisitely woven between the shack the kids were dropped at, a surrounding landscape lush and remote and kids shivering with cold and collecting sticks and making fires for warmth. Getting a match was a major ordeal. This story is a healing one...for anyone who reads it, for those who gathered to tell the tale, and for those few left behind living and thriving. None of what happened to these kids and how they fared in life is lying in a grave forgotten. Nothing gets honey-coated, no one indicted. This secret, unburied, matters for them and for a lot of us who carry terrible secrets, stories needing to be unearthed and for those in the world who should know such things happen and are survived with lingering cost. Brava and gratitude to Janisse Ray for her many years listening and learning and telling. After it is all spun out a redemptive story stands tall. Good for the soul. Good for humanity that we appear to be in danger of losing.
A great boon for me was the incredible local dialect utilized throughout the telling. I was in another world...of croker sacks, poke salat and foot-washing Baptists. The story is exquisitely woven between the shack the kids were dropped at, a surrounding landscape lush and remote and kids shivering with cold and collecting sticks and making fires for warmth. Getting a match was a major ordeal. This story is a healing one...for anyone who reads it, for those who gathered to tell the tale, and for those few left behind living and thriving. None of what happened to these kids and how they fared in life is lying in a grave forgotten. Nothing gets honey-coated, no one indicted. This secret, unburied, matters for them and for a lot of us who carry terrible secrets, stories needing to be unearthed and for those in the world who should know such things happen and are survived with lingering cost. Brava and gratitude to Janisse Ray for her many years listening and learning and telling. After it is all spun out a redemptive story stands tall. Good for the soul. Good for humanity that we appear to be in danger of losing.
May 3, 2023
I'm not even sure where to begin.
First, the only thing beautiful about this story is the artwork on the cover, done by the author's husband, and the writing itself. But, that's where the beauty stops and ugliness begins.
This story is rather mind-blowing. After reading this, what is apparent is human nature can be the most evil, vile thing on this planet, and it's even more despicable when it's about a mother who turns against her young for her own selfish reasons.
This is based on true events about how the Woods children, all eight of them, ranging in age from 10 years old down to a three month old baby, were abandoned by their mother. She takes them up into a mountainous wilderness at the Georgia/North Carolina line, and with only a decrepit shack for shelter, and very little food, she leaves them. It's a surprising story, and even more surprising is it happened in 1945, and people knew about the kids, but many did nothing.
For all of the harshness of what they endured through the four years they lived in worse than squalid conditions, I guess you could say there was additional beauty in the fact that this account shows such a strong bond between brothers and sisters, along with the fortitude of those who had nothing, but through sheer determination, overcame the odds. The story is remarkable. Highly recommend.
First, the only thing beautiful about this story is the artwork on the cover, done by the author's husband, and the writing itself. But, that's where the beauty stops and ugliness begins.
This story is rather mind-blowing. After reading this, what is apparent is human nature can be the most evil, vile thing on this planet, and it's even more despicable when it's about a mother who turns against her young for her own selfish reasons.
This is based on true events about how the Woods children, all eight of them, ranging in age from 10 years old down to a three month old baby, were abandoned by their mother. She takes them up into a mountainous wilderness at the Georgia/North Carolina line, and with only a decrepit shack for shelter, and very little food, she leaves them. It's a surprising story, and even more surprising is it happened in 1945, and people knew about the kids, but many did nothing.
For all of the harshness of what they endured through the four years they lived in worse than squalid conditions, I guess you could say there was additional beauty in the fact that this account shows such a strong bond between brothers and sisters, along with the fortitude of those who had nothing, but through sheer determination, overcame the odds. The story is remarkable. Highly recommend.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 125 reviews