On the Southern Literary Trail discussion

Please leave your initial impressions of Rivers by Michael Farris Smith. If you have questions for Michael, you can post them at the Michael Farris Smith Q&A and he will respond.

Remember, this thread is for initial impressions so please avoid spoilers or use the spoiler brackets to hide them. If you help learning how to use the brackets, please let me know.

There is a scene, early in the book, where a character has been mortally injured, and as his life slowly ebbs, the narration includes three mentions of the phrase, "as he lay dying" on the page. There is always power in the use of three, but was anybody else reminded of Faulkner's title work? Or was it like the three instances of the cock crowing - a religious throwback, since the scene is outside of a dilapidated church? Do you see this as an intentional nod to Faulkner or the writer's unconscious appreciation for that body of work? Are there other books you have you found little homages? Maybe this is just juvenile of me, but I love these - they are like hidden Mickeys or something!

A couple years ago, I first became aware of "easter eggs" in different writers' books. In Serena, Rash has the title character run her hand over a massive dining table – made of one enormous slab of wood, meaning that the tree was huge and the table was very, very expensive. Coincidentally, right before we did an author chat with Rash, I had just finished “The Movie Goer” by Walker Percy. In that story, the main character did the exact same thing with a table in an affluent New Orleans home. How crazy to find two books where somebody rubs their hands on a full slabbed table, right? Nope.

When I commented to Ron about it, he said that his PhD dissertation was on Walker Percy, and he thought about Percy’s work when he wrote the scene with the wood. It was an homage that I'd bumped into!

I also saw in My Sunshine Away that a math teacher - who appears only in a single sentence - was named Mrs. Kornegay, an obvious Easter Egg to Jamie Kornegay, the author of Soil - the two authors are buddies, it turns out.

Did anybody else think of As I Lay Dying?

INTENSE....only on page 34.....please someone......talk me off the cliff.....I am having major urges to read the last page!!!!! I have a major problem!
So as I am posting this, I look up and see LeAnne mentioned Walker Percy....ok I am slightly not thinking of reading last page because I am listening to my first Percy book. Thanks LeAnne, this has helped some. I am going to go read what all you had to say!!!

Laura wrote: "INTENSE....only on page 34.....please someone......talk me off the cliff.....I am having major urges to read the last page!!!!! I have a major problem!
So as I am posting this, I look up and see Le..."

You know you will regret it if you do.

I know, I know!

Read a study that people who read the last page are calmer and can relax and enjoy the book more. I adamantly all my life avoided reading the last page, my best friend always did. After my heart attack, I have relaxed the rule a little, but still tend to try and let the story reveal itself.

Laura? Step away. From the ending! Seriously, the ending will be like a smooth, smoky gumbo after you've added one ingredient after another, then let those deep flavors mix through a long simmer. Don't do it now - it'd just be broth. I swear, you make me want to reread this!

Kim my husband fusses but I tell him, "I always finish the book". I was the kid who unwrapped christmas gifts while parents were gone and then rewrapped before they returned. I'm trying not to look!!!!!

Don't do it, Laura. Remember what you tell your daughter about delayed gratification. Plus, it will make you read faster when you don't know the ending. LuAnne is right with her gumbo analogy, there are so many facets to this book that it won't make real sense to you without knowing the ingredients that go into it.

I am staying strong!

Be strong and enjoy the building of this story. Keep us posted!

Don't Cheat Laura! It is a Book Club Rule ! We throw you out on the street with all of the books that are on our just could not read no matter how hard I tried list . Then for life you are forced to read horrific books and you will have no one to talk with about how terrible these books really are and ask how in the world did they ever get published! It's a lonely world out there without Book club buddies, good books, and good gumbo ! Do not allow yourself to read while unsupervised! HA!
Dawn

Hopefully, she has regained self-control. As for the initial chapters, were you surprised that Cohen did not take a job with Charlie, the old family friend selling black-market goods? We come to understand early on what Cohen's reasons are for staying, but considering that Charlie had been a friend of his father's, I kept hoping Cohen would latch onto some sort of human connection with him.

I've regained control, got through 90 pages, no looking.....still urges and I haven't been able to pick it up today, YET! So far a great read because my nerves are on edge.

I'm loving how the author shows Cohen in the present vs the past. Significant differences but still the shell of the same man.

It seems to me that Cohen always tries to be a good man, no matter the circumstances. If he had followed his head instead of his heart, he would never have stopped to help Mariposa and Evan.

Agreed, Diane! And if he had followed his head instead of his heart, he would have left his household after Elisa died. Was it two years that he had stayed down there after her death? Sentimental man, and we even saw it with him keeping those cherished souvenirs in the little shoebox. When he was cradling that newborn baby, my heart just melted in sympathy for him. Such a good man.

Cohen has a warm heart, but he can also be strong and tough when the situation demands it. In that lawless area south of the Line, he had to protect himself and some vulnerable women and children.

He would be a great character in a movie.

Connie wrote: "He would be a great character in a movie. ."

Jeffrey Dean Morgan would be perfect. Besides he's going to need an image upgrade after the role he's playing in TWD.

Tom wrote: "Connie wrote: "He would be a great character in a movie. ."

Jeffrey Dean Morgan would be perfect. Besides he's going to need an image upgrade after the role he's playing in TWD."

We asked Michael who he would want to play his characters, if a movie version ever came out of Rivers. I'm not sure if you've seen the YA movies based on the book Divergent, but the daughter of Lisa Bonet and Lenny Kravitz plays the main character's best friend. That is who he would see as Mariposa.

Maybe Harry Dean Stanton is too old to play Aggie, but boy - he was very scary as the polygamist cult leader in that HBO series, Big Love.

I am loving this book. I know that's not deep, or a talking point, but it had to be said. This book is gorgeous.

I just commented before reading this thread that this book, in terms of events this book could be an bad action movie or cheesy television series, but it's not. It's elevated from the plot line by the prose and the introspection. I hope it is never made a movie. I mean, I'm sorry Michael Farris Smith, I should wish you all the fame and money that comes with having your book on the big screen, but I don't. Hollywood would really make a terrible mess of it. They always do. Hollywood thinks people are stupid and movies should be stupid too. And this is a smart book.

I'm not very far in. I'm up to the scene Leanne mentions in the first sentence of the first post.

My fingers and toes are getting all wrinkly just from reading this book. It is so well-written that I almost get the feeling that I'll never be dry again. It doesn't help that it's raining outside.

My husband is a building contractor who is a detective of sorts when bad things happen to a house, and one of the worst things to deal with is mold remediation. Mold spores can make people very ill, and contribute to a lot of health problems, including rheumatoid arthritis. I kept thinking of how horrible it would be to be in those wet conditions with no relief. And being a person who loves to cook and eat great food, I'm pretty sure eating out of cans all the time would have driven me over the line pretty early on.

Deborah, in that scene outside the church, I was just gripped when he held holy shards of glass, red and purple and blue. It was like he was clutching at his past, praying and singing with his mother when he was a boy, and may be reaching for a way back to that path of righteousness. The fact that he had to drink himself to sleep every single night had more to do than shutting out the sounds of the storms I think.

Starting in that scene and throughout, I saw all sorts of biblical type situations. The good Samaritan, Noah repopulating a vanquished earth, Moses leading his people to the land of milk and honey - I think that since the south is considered the Bible belt, there are often semi religious references and books. Maybe because those are the kinds of stories little kids grew up hearing and it becomes unconscious for writers.

It makes the writing richer. I love when art nods to art and to history and to religion.

LeAnne wrote: "Starting in that scene and throughout, I saw all sorts of biblical type situations. The good Samaritan, Noah repopulating a vanquished earth, Moses leading his people to the land of milk and honey -."

Add to that the fact that the meaning of the name Cohen is 'priest'.

This book is so well written and brings out some interesting conversation. Tom, I never knew Cohen meant priest. Very interesting. My word, LeAnne, we both loved that church scene. Every time we have a thunderstorm I think about Cohen holed up in that molding church.

Leanne, I envision Aggie as Jonathan Banks from Better Call Saul/ Breaking Bad.

Tina wrote: "Leanne, I envision Aggie as Jonathan Banks from Better Call Saul/ Breaking Bad."

That might work. He looks perfect for it but his characters are pretty dry. He'd need to add a bit of Tuco Salamanca to his Mike Ehrmantraut.

Tom, I love it! A Tuco/Mike combo would be perfect.

I was feeling left out , so I wanted to just stick my two cents worth in and say this is turning out to be one of my favorite reads . I know why too! As I started , the whole feel of this novel feels like my all time favorite Cormac McCarthy The Road . It is completely different in many ways but the feeling and mood is still so fresh in my mind because I just read The Road this past July while my Daddy was taking Radiation treatments for his Cancer. All through that read , I felt my world was ending and my Daddy was preparing me to be on my own .

At the first part of the book , first or second chapter , Cohen rides out in the dark on Habana and lays loose on her back and amidst the rain and thunder he yells for his wife Elissa ! I felt that desperation and sense of desperation as I felt when I read The Road . This is another journey to survive , but I have just started . Why does Cohen want to survive ? That is what is making me scared to go on . What is inside him that gives him the motivation to keep going ? I know I have not read enough. But , I could not after that emotional stuff . Then the kids almost killing him . I just had to pause for a bit .
What is going to keep him going and what is going to keep me going when all is said and done ?
Dawn

Dawn, keep reading.

Dawn, listen to Tina. Keep going! Smith makes you feel that desolation and rain soaked despondency in your bones, then boom! Like the crack of thunder, he has reason to go on.

Is it just me or did Michael intend it this way? Every scene of this book that I have read, I envision as taking place in the dark in a torrential rainstorm . I know that a lot of what happened takes place in the daytime but my impression is that the setting is as dark and dismal as it can possibly get.

I envisioned more gray and cumulous and thunderhead clouds than blackness. However, I have no hurricane type weather experience.

When we did the author chat with him, he said he was tempted to bring in some sunshiny days to lighten things every now and then.

But then he changed his mind and decided to hammer everything relentlessly with the rain and overcast skies. The flashback scenes, by comparison, were light and bubbly to me - even if it was something as simple as walking on the beach with his wife and eating boiled shrimp washed down with a cold beer.

I did notice that the only day with beautiful blue skies was SPOILER AHEAD...KINDA...............the morning after he had delivered the baby, and they ended up capturing Aggie to reclaim their freedom.

I wondered how he ever managed to keep his cigarettes dry.

Laura wrote: "I envisioned more gray and cumulous and thunderhead clouds than blackness. However, I have no hurricane type weather experience."

Grey and gloomy at the best of times and nightmarish hurricane conditions at others. Depressing and damp every single day. Wears me out just thinking about it.

Tom wrote: "I wondered how he ever managed to keep his cigarettes dry."

I laughed when I read this. This is a very good question because it was damp and rainy every day.

Fabulous flow to the book that makes me never find a spot where I feel I can lay it down and do the things all of us have to do besides read. I find myself thinking about it the entire time I am gone and anxious to get back again. I was glad to see Part III show up, because the blank page gave me a forced break!

LOL, Sara! Hooray for a section break!

That was a great read. I keep finding a lot of my favorite books with this book club. Thank you for picking such great stuff.

Deborah wrote: "That was a great read. I keep finding a lot of my favorite books with this book club. Thank you for picking such great stuff."

It's the members who choose the books.

Well, you picked Carrying Albert Home, and I am thoroughly enjoying it, so thank you for that one!

This month's reads were especially good, and the discussions as well. Having two authors participate was a stroke of luck, thank you Tom and LeAnne for arranging that. Just imagine if Harlan Ellison were still alive and we could have talked him into a Q&A for "Invisible Man". The book is mind-blowing.

While we are complimenting the group, I would like to say I really appreciate voting early so I can either purchase or get my name on waiting list at the library. If waited too long, I might miss out on more of the reads. Yes, much thanks to Tom and LeAnne! Of course, I think they are both awesome!!!!

Diane wrote: "This month's reads were especially good, and the discussions as well. Having two authors participate was a stroke of luck, thank you Tom and LeAnne for arranging that. Just imagine if Harlan Elliso..."

After having him participate by phone with an author chat and a bizarre scavenger hunt based on RIVERS, I was kinda worried that my freak flag was flying too high, but Michael was a good sport and said he'd be glad to join us. I hid bags of beef jerky under the front seat of my next door neighbor's rag-top jeep and made them dig under the neighborhood kiddie slide to find casino treasure in a shoebox.

So, yeah - y'all have no idea what a truly good sport he is to do a second thing this month. Boy don't scare easy!

LeAnne wrote: "Diane wrote: "This month's reads were especially good, and the discussions as well. Having two authors participate was a stroke of luck, thank you Tom and LeAnne for arranging that. Just imagine if..."

Makes me appreciate him and you all the more.

I was really looking forward to reading this one, unfortunately our library does not have a copy... I mean the entire library system, not one copy. sigh An unfortunate consequence of recently having moved out of the South.