Town Smokes

by Pinckney Benedict

The debut collection by one of our foremost younger fiction writers. A widely hailed first collection of stories set mostly in the rural South.

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction, Southern, United States

168 pages, Paperback

First published May 17, 1987

About the author

Pinckney Benedict (b. 1964) is an American short-story writer and novelist whose work often reflects his Appalachian background.

Benedict grew up on his family’s dairy farm in Greenbrier County, West Virginia. He graduated from Princeton University, where he studied primarily with Joyce Carol Oates, in 1986, and from the Writers’ Workshop at the University of Iowa in 1988.

He has published three collections of short fiction, Miracle Boy and Other Stories, Town Smokes, and The Wrecking Yard and a novel Dogs of God, the last three of which were named Notable Books by The New York Times, and all of which have been published in England, Germany, and France. He has another book, Wild Bleeding Heart (a novel, due out in 2010).

His stories have appeared in, among other magazines and anthologies, Esquire, Zoetrope: All-Story, StoryQuarterly, Ontario Review, Appalachian Heritage, the O. Henry Award series (twice), the New Stories from the South series (twice), the Pushcart Prize series (three times), and The Oxford Book of American Short Stories. Along with his wife, the novelist Laura Benedict, he has edited the poetry and fiction anthology Surreal South (Press 53 2007), which includes work from, among others, Robert Olen Butler, Joyce Carol Oates, William Gay, Ron Rash, and Rodney Jones.

He wrote the screenplay for the feature film Four Days (Cite Amerique 2000), which starred Colm Meaney (The Commitments, television’s Star Trek: The Next Generation), Lolita Davidovich (Blaze), and William Forsythe (The Rock).

Reviews

[Orsodimondo · Rating 3 out of 5]

ANIME DA COMBATTIMENTO



Si potrebbe definirlo enfant prodige questo Pinckney Benedict che debuttò a soli ventitre anni nel 1987 con questa raccolta di nove racconti che fu subito accolta molto bene e insignita di vari premi.
Otto anni dopo il suo primo romanzo Dogs of God - letto anche questo – e poi quasi più nulla, il prodigio si è dissolto. E in italiano non è mai riuscito ad approdare.



Benedict racconta il mondo che conosce meglio, quello del sud, degli Appalachi, della West Virginia dove è nato. Mette in campo gli uomini duri di quelle terre, che vivono in case malandate o in roulotte traballanti, che lavorano in fabbriche di pneumatici o macelli, che sono lenti a parlare ma pronti a esplodere di rabbia. Un mondo dove la violenza è latente, quasi non vissuta come tale, e dove le donne sono figure marginali.
Storie forti, potenti, e anche molto cupe. E come dicevo, violente, cruente: sparatorie, serpente scuoiato, l’uccisione di un maiale, la rissa in un bar con teste spaccate, combattimenti tra cani, accoltellamenti.



Fango, auto arrugginite abbandonate nel giardino di casa, piccole imprese di trasformazione alimentare, distillerie domestiche, sigarette comprate sfuse nel negozio del paese… Viaggio in un’America infernale che vive in valli e colline come se il mondo fosse tutto e solo lì.

A metà strada tra un altro cantore dei brutti-sporchi-cattivi degli stati del sud quale Tom Franklin e la più algida Joyce Carol Oates, Benedict dovrebbe imparare a regalare al lettore almeno un respiro ogni tanto, un briciolo di leggerezza, uno spiraglio.

[Alberto Sepúlveda]

Cómo me gusta a mí un buen libro sobre sureños y rednecks que son mucho más que sureños y rednecks. Personas con miedo, con desesperanza, con hartazgo, pero también con ambiciones y querencias. Qué bueno es el relato que da nombre al libro, qué bueno son casi todos.

Una pasada de libro si te planteas pillarte una caravana, una barbacoa grasienta y una escopeta y pirarte a Almería a hacer Moonshine y vender setas alucinógenas.

[Swaps55 · Rating 5 out of 5]

Call me biased, as the author was my mentor/advisor/etc. in college, but he really is one of the best writers I've ever read, and taught me just about everything I know about how to not just write a story, but write a good one. They are full of southern/appalachia flavor, so if you are a fan of southern writers you absolutley must have this on your shelf.

[Sheryl · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is another book I'd grab upon fleeing my burning house. I am stingy with my books, but this is one I loan and sometimes give to people I love. In fact, who has it right now? I want it back. Ple-ee-ase...

[Jeff · Rating 5 out of 5]

Perhaps my favorite book in the subgenre of Appalachian fiction. Darkly funny, sad, violent, and original.

[Liam · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5*

[Pere J. Garcia Munar · Rating 3 out of 5]

Encara que només sigui pel disseny preciós (per jo, l'editorial de narrativa que més m'agrada), per la cura i per la passió que hi posen en cada llibre, val la pena llegir qualsevol cosa de Dirty Works Editorial

Però si a més el contingut mola, doncs molt millor. I els contes de "Verraco" de Pickney Benedict són xulos.

Vida quotidiana de vides no tant quotidianes. Gent del sud d'Estats Units, armes, violència, paisatges, animals, alcohol, casetes i remolcs... tot contat amb senzillesa i naturalitat.

És un món que ens cau lluny, però que mola descobrir.

[Peacegal · Rating 4 out of 5]

Town Smokes is a book of short stories, which often centered on the interactions between rural people and animals—which particularly interested me. We see occasional compassion, such as that of a family that became too attached to the rabbits they bred to sell them for meat, but the majority of these interactions are characterized by the casual cruelty of a man scooping up fleeing crawdads and dumping them into a boiling pot. This is a world of shooting harmful-only-to-rodents black snakes and jacklighting deer.

There’s Booze, the elderly boar who is coming to the end of a life spent terrorizing a community. His viciousness and appetite were the stuff of legend.

“That Booze,” Tobe said, moving on to another hog. “Like to put him up against a pit dog one day.”

Hog-dogging is the lesser-known cousin of the infamous “sport” of dog fighting. Either way, the breeds of choice are the usual abusees—the pit bull terrier and the Staffordshire bull—dogs which are the “for us, by us” of sadistic animal abusers.

This book contains a dog fighting story titled “Pit,” however; the dogs featured are not the usual fighting breeds.

The spitz was awful quick and a better fighter than his size might make you think. He was out of King Generator up in Pocahontas County, and King Generator was a dog that was born to fight.

Interestingly, this image of the Spitz as a relentless beast may have been borne out of early vilification of the breed by New York legislators. The medium-sized, long-furred dogs were thought to have been especially susceptible to rabies, and worse, closely associated with the German immigrant population. Despite this early panic, the dogs’ behavior simply didn’t live up to popular fears.

However, this passage does give us an important insight into the dog fighting mentality: top winners are carefully guarded as important breeding animals. These animal abusers realize violent aggression is not just a product of nurture, but also nature. So they do train and condition their dogs to be better killers, but they start out by choosing a vicious bloodline first.

When the black mongrel the spitz was fighting comes out on top, we read

They liked his style, and there was no telling how much a dog that could kill a son out of King Generator was worth.

Top fighters are worth huge amounts of money in the breeding fees they generate alone. “Blame the deed?” I say, “Blame the breeder”…

Messed-up stuff? Indeed. But unlike other books of this nature, I feel the author was only reporting, not glamorizing or idealizing these inhumane “rural ways.” Reporting the truth is something I can respect, even when it is done in the context of fictional stories.

[Charles White · Rating 3 out of 5]

"The Sutton Pie Safe" and "Town Smokes" are both excellent stories. Many of the others seemed to lack something for me.

[Max Kromholc · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a nice small book of short stories that apparently isn’t all that known. I was intrigued by the cover and the description when I found it at a charity store so I figured I’d give it a go. It was a very melancholic and occasionally violent mid-west depiction of ennui. There’s a little bit of Carver in the small slices of Americana that left me with a feeling similar to when I finish his work.

The Sutton pie safe - 4/10 probably the weakest of them all and a poor way to start the book, was concerned for a moment that this was to be fire-fodder.

Booze - 9/10 a banger of a story that took me nicely by surprise and swept me into the tusks of that elusive boar at the heart of this story.

All the dead - 6/10 didn’t like the prose all too much.

Hackberry - 7/10 so very lonely and stark.

Dog - 8/10 fantastic stagnant story that was gross and felt so much like a cry for help.

Pit - 5/10 fairly cliche story that didn’t do too much a million crime films have done before.

Fat Tuesday - 8/10 another melancholic slice of life that felt so hollow. Now I want to try crawdads.

Water witch - 9/10 absolute banger, haunting and unique.

Town smokes - 7/10 so much yearning. A fitting end.

[John Tipper · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the third book I've read by Benedict, and it's the strongest one. Published in 1987, when he was 22 years old, Town Smokes won the Nelson Algren Award. It has vivid settings and gritty characters. The rural atmosphere of West Virginia is well drawn. The characters are authentic and hard bitten. The prose captures the rhythms of Appalachia. The themes are violence, loss, and the battle for survival. In the story Town Smokes a young boy narrator lives in the mountains. His father dies in an accident when he's cutting down a tree, which falls on him. His uncle is a hard drinker and a logger too. The boy wants to take his belongings and go into town to buy cigarettes. Walking down the mountain, he's confronted by two other boys, who are hunting a pig. One has a rifle. They rob the narrator and take his shoes, leaving him with nothing. He manages to walk to a drug store, where he asks for cigarettes. Feeling sorry for the boy, the owner gives him a pack. There has been a flood that devastated the area. The boy goes onto a bridge, and smokes Camels. The collection compares to early Joyce Carol Oates, Cormac McCarthy, and Breece Pancake. Benedict is a better stylist than Pancake, however.

[Sergio Egido · Rating 3 out of 5]

Una serie de relatos cortos al más puro estilo americano de los años 40/50. Cuentos que tienen algo en común, la pobreza de esos años a consecuencia de “La gran depresión”.

Gran capacidad de P. Benedict para hacer mantener el hilo y la tensión al lector.

Desenlaces poco llamativos, bastante pobres y que muestran gran neutralidad con los problemas que han de afrontar los diferentes protagonistas de esta inusual recopilación.

[Ryan Gilchrist · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ah yes, stories where nothing happens - my favorite. In all 'seriousness' finding tenderness in brutality and poignancy in the mundane is what all my favorite art accomplishes. Here lies a prime example. It hurts to hold this book in your hands yet you can't stop laughing.

[Matt Brown · Rating 5 out of 5]

up there with breece d’j pancake, flannery o’connor, or cormac mccarthy’s appalachian novels.

[Jonathon · Rating 5 out of 5]

I thoroughly enjoyed this collection of short stories authored by a great friend of mine. This is five star stuff all the way!

[Patrick Strickland · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good stories. Somewhat similar, but all good. Pinckney Benedict's got his voice on lock in this collection.

[Criswi · Rating 3 out of 5]

La literatura americana más ruda, y descarnada. Personajes absolutamente marginales, agrestes e incivilizados

Más que rednecks son auténticos “gañanes” de los Apalaches.

Sigo haciendo esfuerzos con este género, pero queda muy lejos de nuestra realidad

[María · Rating 4 out of 5]

VERRACO, de Pinckney Benedict. Traducción de Javier Lucini.

DESGRACIADOS SIN RETORNO

Los nueves cuentos que reúne Pinckney Benedict en Verraco no se sujetan a un marco narrativo común, y sin embargo cuesta decir que estas breves narraciones vayan por libre: todos ellos se fijan en el paisaje rural estadounidense, y por todos ellos caminan hombres sin rumbo, exiliados de la civilización o de ellos mismos, enfrentados entre sí y contra una naturaleza que sufre y les devuelve su crueldad.

En La fresquera Sutton, Verraco, Todos los muertos, Hackberry, Perro, Foso, Mardi Gras, Zahorí y Cigarrillos reinan la desolación y la bestialidad. No hay redención para aquellos que escogen la violencia y el engaño, incluso si lo hacen para salir adelante y no para salirse con la suya. En todos estos relatos, aunque –admirablemente– sin caer en la repetición, el autor pone en entredicho la superioridad moral y racional de hombres y mujeres que, de un modo u otro, se enfrentan a su entorno y a las consecuencias de sus acciones. Son exiliados que caminan entre serpientes desolladas, cerdos asesinos, perros infectos, cuervos polvorientos, cangrejos escaldados y vacas deshidratadas; bestias todas que, en realidad, no son más que la continuación animal de una panda de desgraciados. La prosa de Benedict, que varía entre la primera y la tercera persona, comunica sin trampa ni cartón la precariedad y la soledad de estos seres marginales, así como la aridez absoluta de su entorno; el autor consigue dar a cada personaje una voz propia y encontrar el balance adecuado entre diálogos y descripciones en el espacio medio de 20 páginas que ocupa cada relato. Es destacable, sin duda, la traducción al español de Javier Lucini, que conserva la naturalidad y la variedad del discurso en una notable variedad de registros.

El lector que se adentre en Verraco debe abandonar toda esperanza si lo que busca son personajes inclusivos, feministas, vegetarianos o, simplemente, felices. Pero en ningún momento debe renunciar a descubrir unos personajes convincentes, que atraviesan un momento más de sus vidas, que acaban con ellas o con las de otros, que cometen crímenes o que los transigen. Personajes que, pese a todo, siguen adelante: en el camino los aguardan criaturas de todas las especies, decididas a irrumpir en sus vidas como fuerza vengadora, como espejo desolador o como ironía del destino.

[elderfoil...the whatever champion · Rating 3 out of 5]

His prose is good, but the first and last stories ("The Sutton Pie Safe" and "Town Smokes") are the only ones that move beyond chatter and shoot toward real insight. "Town Smokes" (the story, not the collection) was particularly effective, dark, and fatalistic, moving from the mundane towards something far more haunting, timeless, even allegorical. That story alone makes the collection valuable, but no one should mistake this for Breece Pancake. It appears that Benedict crafts stories about a periphery he has mostly only heard about in his home state, while Pancake breathes it.

[Kim · Rating 3 out of 5]

A couple amazing stories and some just so so. Almost all the stories involve the relationship between people and animals in the south. I found that interesting. The Pie Safe was my fav.

[Marvin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Solid collection of stories focused on rural characters.