Fred Chappell is the award-winning author of over twenty books of poetry and fiction. His previous novels include I Am One of You Forever and Brighten the Corner Where You Are. He teaches at the University of North Carolina in Grennsboro, where he lives with his wife Susan.
"Fred Chappell's narrative voice is a wonder and a joy--a combination of elegant erudition, lyric brilliance, and the idiom of Appalachia . . . Both a celebration of the southern Appalachian Mountains and a way of life and a lamentation for its loss . . . A master storyteller . . . ranging from tall tales that provide out-loud laughter to poetic, lyric passages that produce a lump in the throat." --The Miami Herald "What a glorious time Fred Chappell must have had writing this fourth volume of his tetralogy . . . for it sparkles and amuses and rocks along in such an easy, happy voice . . . No one does a more impressive look back than Fred Chappell, our poet laureate." --Winston-Salem Journal "A novel cycle destined to be cherished not just as a Southern, but as an American classic." --Orlando Sentinel "Fans of Southern fiction should not miss this beautifully written novel." --Chicago Tribune "A book sparkling with life and charm . . . A celebration of life's great moments." --Christian Science Monitor "Delightful . . . We don't want to miss a single funny phrase, a charming old word, or a sudden twist of the tale, involving people we wish we knew." --Arkansas Democrat Gazette "Fred Chappell crafts the kind of novels other writers greet with envy. A natural storyteller who hails from Appalachia, he weaves together tall tales, dreams and visions, and page upon page of pitch-perfect dialogue into a style that's like the white-lightnin'' cousin of magical realism." --Atlanta Journal-Constitution "There's something fearless about the fervid quality of this book that's strangely beguiling. You can enter the Kirkman family quartet at any given point, but perhaps it is Jess Kirkman's advanced age that has given this final installment a bittersweet tone lacking--because unnecessary--in the others. It makes Look Back All the Green Valley stick in your memory not like a fantastic tall tale, but like an urgent message from the author: Don't forget me." --The News & Record (Greensboro, N.C.) "Chappell . . . narrates with his trademark voice, one both poetic and inclusive of the idioms of the Appalachain Mountain region . . . Intelligent and rewarding." --Publishers Weekly "Chappell's irrepressible humor and homespun wisdom depict a long-gone way of southern Appalachian life. A loving look back to a long-ago time and place." --Library Journal "Chappell draws upon the rich oral traditions, myths, and legends of southern Appalachia to take his readers deep into the heart of a world and time long past, with all its magic, mystery and wonder." --Bookwatch "Delightful . . . A work of matchless ingenuity and eloquence--heartwarmingly funny." --Kirkus Reviews
Joe Robert Kirkman has been dead for 10 years, and his wife, Cora, is ailing when their son, poet and college professor Jess, returns to the mountains of western North Carolina in the final volume of the Kirkman saga, Chappell's chronicle of this curious Appalachian family. Strong-willed but incurably depressed, Cora has already begun preparations for her own death. Because of a mixup at the local cemetery, the family burial plot must be relocated, and Jess and his sister, Mitzi, are ordered to find a suitable new plot, for which they begin entreating neighbors who may have land to spare. Meanwhile, Jess must finally clean out his father's abandoned shed of a workshop. During the excavation, Jess discovers a map marked with the names of women, which he believes may be an adulterous "black book." He sets out to find the women in question, and to perhaps discover his father through the evidence of his sins, though what he finally unearths is both more honorable and more bizarre than anything he could have imagined. The unfolding tale is both a traditional mystery and a journey of introspection, the former shaped by oral history while the latter is governed by private memory. Both follow a pattern dictated by Jess's struggle to translate passages of Dante's Inferno, which acts here as a thematic chorus. Chappell studs his novel with autobiographical quirks (Jess writes under the pseudonym "Fred Chappell"), and narrates with his trademark voice, one both poetic and inclusive of the idioms of the Appalachian Mountain region. Fans of Chappell (Farewell, I'm Bound to Leave You; Brighten the Corner Where You Are) will find this an intelligent and rewarding if sentimental closure to the Kirkman cycle. (Sept.) Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.
"Fred Chappell's narrative voice is a wonder and a joy--a combination of elegant erudition, lyric brilliance, and the idiom of Appalachia . . . Both a celebration of the southern Appalachian Mountains and a way of life and a lamentation for its loss . . . A master storyteller . . . ranging from tall tales that provide out-loud laughter to poetic, lyric passages that produce a lump in the throat." --The Miami Herald "What a glorious time Fred Chappell must have had writing this fourth volume of his tetralogy . . . for it sparkles and amuses and rocks along in such an easy, happy voice . . . No one does a more impressive look back than Fred Chappell, our poet laureate." --Winston-Salem Journal "A novel cycle destined to be cherished not just as a Southern, but as an American classic." --Orlando Sentinel "Fans of Southern fiction should not miss this beautifully written novel." --Chicago Tribune "A book sparkling with life and charm . . . A celebration of life's great moments." --Christian Science Monitor "Delightful . . . We don't want to miss a single funny phrase, a charming old word, or a sudden twist of the tale, involving people we wish we knew." --Arkansas Democrat Gazette "Fred Chappell crafts the kind of novels other writers greet with envy. A natural storyteller who hails from Appalachia, he weaves together tall tales, dreams and visions, and page upon page of pitch-perfect dialogue into a style that's like the white-lightnin'' cousin of magical realism." --Atlanta Journal-Constitution "There's something fearless about the fervid quality of this book that's strangely beguiling. You can enter the Kirkman family quartet at any given point, but perhaps it is Jess Kirkman's advanced age that has given this final installment a bittersweet tone lacking--because unnecessary--in the others. It makes Look Back All the Green Valley stick in your memory not like a fantastic tall tale, but like an urgent message from the author: Don't forget me." --The News & Record (Greensboro, N.C.) "Chappell . . . narrates with his trademark voice, one both poetic and inclusive of the idioms of the Appalachain Mountain region . . . Intelligent and rewarding." --Publishers Weekly "Chappell's irrepressible humor and homespun wisdom depict a long-gone way of southern Appalachian life. A loving look back to a long-ago time and place." --Library Journal "Chappell draws upon the rich oral traditions, myths, and legends of southern Appalachia to take his readers deep into the heart of a world and time long past, with all its magic, mystery and wonder." --Bookwatch "Delightful . . . A work of matchless ingenuity and eloquence--heartwarmingly funny." --Kirkus Reviews
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