Two books - one picture click the photos if you wishOver the summer I read two books which seemed at first to have nothing to do with one another but which are deeply rooted together. I usually read ebooks from our local library. Each time I open Libby, the app our library uses, the first screen entices me with new acquisitions. One day in January when I saw a book with an intriguing title I borrowed it. The Book Woman of Troublesome CreekSo I began to read a new historical novel by Kim Michele Richardson. Richardson lives in Kentucky and all her books explore the area she loves. She's a genuine regional novelist. This book is set in the years of the The Pack Horse Library Project which was part of President Roosevelt's Works Progress Administration (WPA). Author draws compelling character
There were blue skinned people around Troublesome Creek. They were the hereditary group that descended from a French immigrant Martin Fulgate and they suffered from hereditary methemoglobinemia which turns their skin blue. In Richardson's story, Cussy is widely, but not entirely, despised, ostracised and nicknamed Bluet. And unlike the librarians in the picture she is too poor to own a horse so she rides a mule. A gripping readRead Cussy's story; sense the thirst for books and learning among the mountain people she serves, even those with too little to eat; be horrified by the tragedies she sees; feel anger at the hate she endures; identify with her struggles and her hopes; pray for a happy ending. This New York Times and USA Today bestseller is a good read. ----------Hillbilly Elegy
RawJD Vance's book is a personal, direct, raw but at times tender and even funny story of growing up In Middletown, Ohio. I looked up Middletown. It has a crime rate 138% higher than the American average. His grand parents had moved there from Jackson – part of the populous migration from the Appalachian townships and mountain settlements to industrial cities to find work. That work, such as steel mills, gradually died. Instability
It was a story that even I found incredible. Mom had been working as a nurse at a local dialysis center, a job she'd held for a few months. Her boss, about ten years her senior, asked her out to dinner one night. She obliged, and with her relationship in shambles, she agreed to marry him a week later. She told me on a Thursday. On Saturday we moved into Ken's house. His home was my fourth in two years.' OutcomeJD survived this and much other turmoil. He eventually found his way out of his local culture, served as a marine, graduated from Ohio State University, then went on to graduate from Yale Law School. Hillbilly Elegy became a sensation 2016-18 and so did it's author. President Trump was elected by people from the 'rust states' such as Ohio and consequently JD Vance was frequently turned to as a television and printed word commentator to explain why. OriginsThese two books with their history roots in the same Appalachians, I found fascinating. I suppose my American readers have already read them. Maybe my other readers have not. Different genres though they are, I recommend them both. □ John McInnes Friday 6 March 2020 Publishing details The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek: Paperback, 308 pages 2019 by Sourcebooks Landmark Hillbilly Elegy: William Collins GB 2016; Harper USA 2016 Note: There will not be a post to this blog Friday 13 March. There will be a post 20 March. ##########
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