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Outskirts Press, Inc.
The Devil's Back
The Devil's Back
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A Rare Treat for Lovers of Adventure, Romance, and Language.
THE DEVIL'S BACK is a "must read" for anyone living in the Southern Appalachians, although as Mark Powell, author of THE SHELTERING, points out, "it will resonate not only with Appalachian readers, but with all readers."
The novel's title refers to an old Appalachian saying: "What goes over the Devil's back comes back under his belly." It's another way of saying, "One reaps what he sows," or "What goes around comes around." In the course of the novel, the truth of that saying is sometimes borne out and sometimes not.
The novel is set in a fictional county of Eastern Kentucky in the early years of the twentieth century. Told through four narrative perspectives, it is about the May-December marriage of Adam Moore and Laurey Castle, neither of whom approaches marriage with enthusiasm.
Adam has had no interest in matrimony since he was fifteen and rejected by a local prostitute. He becomes interested at age thirty-seven mainly because he sees the available young women of child-bearing age becoming increasingly less interested in him and age is making him ever less able to keep up the inheritance his father left him: the homeplace and his aging mother. At last, he realizes he needs sons and a wife young enough to bear them.
On Laurey's part, she does not look forward to marrying a man old enough to be her father. Although she has always liked Adam, she does not love him and is not even sure what it means to love. Furthermore, marrying him means she must move off the Yon Side to White Oak Hollow, where he lives. At that time, moving to the other side of a rural Appalachian county meant as much separation from one's roots as moving to England would today.
In spite of their reluctance to marry, Adam and Laurey grow to love each other. But they have their share of problems. Adam keeps fathering daughters, although he desperately need sons. and when impotence hits him, he becomes insanely jealous of every man who comes near Laurey. And Laurey must struggle with her separation from the two people she loves best, Pap and Aunt Molly; with her inability to feel a mother's love; and eventually with Adam's growing jealousy.
Will this marriage survive? Parsons keeps you guessing until the last page is turned.
THE DEVIL'S BACK is a "must read" for anyone living in the Southern Appalachians, although as Mark Powell, author of THE SHELTERING, points out, "it will resonate not only with Appalachian readers, but with all readers."
The novel's title refers to an old Appalachian saying: "What goes over the Devil's back comes back under his belly." It's another way of saying, "One reaps what he sows," or "What goes around comes around." In the course of the novel, the truth of that saying is sometimes borne out and sometimes not.
The novel is set in a fictional county of Eastern Kentucky in the early years of the twentieth century. Told through four narrative perspectives, it is about the May-December marriage of Adam Moore and Laurey Castle, neither of whom approaches marriage with enthusiasm.
Adam has had no interest in matrimony since he was fifteen and rejected by a local prostitute. He becomes interested at age thirty-seven mainly because he sees the available young women of child-bearing age becoming increasingly less interested in him and age is making him ever less able to keep up the inheritance his father left him: the homeplace and his aging mother. At last, he realizes he needs sons and a wife young enough to bear them.
On Laurey's part, she does not look forward to marrying a man old enough to be her father. Although she has always liked Adam, she does not love him and is not even sure what it means to love. Furthermore, marrying him means she must move off the Yon Side to White Oak Hollow, where he lives. At that time, moving to the other side of a rural Appalachian county meant as much separation from one's roots as moving to England would today.
In spite of their reluctance to marry, Adam and Laurey grow to love each other. But they have their share of problems. Adam keeps fathering daughters, although he desperately need sons. and when impotence hits him, he becomes insanely jealous of every man who comes near Laurey. And Laurey must struggle with her separation from the two people she loves best, Pap and Aunt Molly; with her inability to feel a mother's love; and eventually with Adam's growing jealousy.
Will this marriage survive? Parsons keeps you guessing until the last page is turned.
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