Reading the South
New Fiction by Regional Authors, May 2003
by Hal Jacobs
for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Daniel Wallace's The Watermelon King (Houghton Mifflin, $23) spins a tall tale about a little Alabama town that worships watermelons. It's a sweet and juicy scenario as the people of Ashland hold a spring festival to celebrate their bodacious harvest. But instead of bluegrass on the main stage, the main event at their festival is a good, old-fashioned pagan sex rite.

To appease the mysterious forces of sun, soil and seed, they sacrifice the virginity of the oldest eligible male. This watermelon king is wheeled into town on the last day of the festival: "His crown, a hollowed-out rind; his scepter, a dried and withered vine. The people would watch, cheering him with their laughter. Then a ring of fire was set around him as the sun went down, and around this ring the town would slowly gather."

Ready or not, the king lies down with an eager bachelorette who has been chosen earlier in the day.

When Thomas Rider arrives in town, he wants merely to find out what happened to his mother 18 years ago: She disappeared shortly after giving birth to him. After interviewing a bunch of locals (their oral history is presented in short chapters), Thomas learns that his lively mother became part of the town's legend when she strongly objected to the humiliating annual ritual.

He also discovers that the not-so-good people of Ashland have been patiently awaiting his arrival to make things right.

In The Watermelon King, Wallace hits all the right notes of magical realism, creating a world where the supernatural fits alongside the ordinary, where storytellers stretch the plausible, and terror, fear and violence lurk below the surface. The result is an adult fairy tale with engaging characters --- village idiot, waitress, traveling salesman, pharmacist --- who bring a piquant, modern-day folk tale flavor to the fable.

Wallace is the author of two earlier novels, Big Fish and Ray in Reverse. He lives in Chapel Hill, N.C.

***

Frank Turner Hollon's A Thin Difference (MacAdam/Cage, $22) carries a legal drama through the hot, lonely streets of a small Alabama town. Jack Skinner is a criminal defense attorney with a fondness for big, greasy cheeseburgers. Just like his digestive system, his personal life is a mess. He bears the scars of divorces, debts and troubled adult children.

Despite all this, Skinner is a decent guy who, after 30 years of law practice, still gives a damn about his clients. Lately, though, the pickings have been rather lean. That's why he jumps at the offer to represent a stranger in town. It's a minor case, but the stranger is carrying plenty of cash.

A few days later, when the man is accused of murder, Skinner agrees to defend him. It's the biggest case of Skinner's career. It also packs a wallop that he never sees coming.

To its credit, "A Thin Difference" feels more like a crime novel of the 1940s than a contemporary thriller. Hollon plants enough incriminating evidence on all his characters so they all seem guilty of something, but settles it so that only one of them will serve hard time.

Hollon practices law in Baldwin County, Ala. He is the author of "The God File" and "The Pains of April."

***

Also check out these new novels by regional writers. . .

Wilmoth Foreman's Summer of the Skunks (Front Street, $15.95). It's one of those long summers in a 10-year-old's life that begins with skunks moving under the house. And before the summer is over, the child understands a little more about herself. Foreman grew up on a 5-acre farm on the outskirts of Columbia, Tenn.

Opening lines: 'Wake up, Jill!' Mama's voice comes soft but urgent through my thick fog of sleep. 'We've got skunks under the house.' 'Uunnh?' I groan and stretch. My elbow bumps the wall. 'Shhh! No noise.' Her hand is on my shoulder, calming me. 'A mama skunk and her little ones. They've moved in under our house.' 'How do you know?' I sniff the air. There's a faint odor of skunk, but it's no worse than if one had ambled past my window.

***

Ann B. Ross's Miss Julia Hits the Road (Viking, $24.95). In this fourth installment of Miss Julia's big adventures, the snippy yet charming widow with impeccable southern manners goes on the road to save her housekeeper's neighborhood from a greedy landlord. Ross is the author of six novels and lives in Hendersonville, North Carolina.

Opening lines: Pushing through the swinging door from the dining room, I started talking before I got into the kitchen good. 'Lillian, I need to ask you something, and I want a serious answer. What in the world is wrong with Sam Murdoch?' She turned away from the sink and squinched her eyes at me. 'They's not one thing wrong with Mr. Sam. An' what I think, Miss Julia, is you ought not be pickin' on him.'

***

Deborah Smith's Sweet Hush (Little, Brown and Company, $23.95). A young widow's apple orchards in north Georgia become overrun with Secret Service and media hordes after her Harvard-educated son marries the daughter of the U.S. president. Smith is the author of eight novels and lives in the north Georgia mountains.

Opening lines: Earn the blessings. We McGillens had always had to earn our blessings on the cruel grace of the seasons and the hard red hope of ripe apples. Our legacy started in 1865 with Hush Campbell McGillen, a young Scottish woman whose husband, Thomas, died in pieces at the Battle of Bull Run. We suspect Thomas McGillen was a Pennsylvania Scotsman in the service of the Union Army, but Great-Great-Great Grandmother Hush never admitted such a notorious thing after she came to enemy territory in the Appalachian South. She brought with her four half-grown sons and daughters, a mule, a wagon, fifty dollars, and a bag of apple seeds gathered from every orchard she'd passed between Pennsylvania and Georgia.

***

Merry Whiteford's If Wishes Were Horses (Thomas Dunne Books, $23.95). In this coming-of-age novel set in 1974, a 16-year-old girl tries to make sense of the broken pieces of her life, which involves sharing a rundown home with three other foster children, visiting her alcoholic mother, and becoming pregnant. Whiteford is the award-winning author of two other novels and lives in Virginia.

Opening lines: In the middle of the twentieth century, in Onondaga County in the middle of New York State, if you were a child between one place and another, a child without proper guardians-a child unlucky or unloved-you were in the care of Providence, House of Providence, the orphanage on Salt Springs Road run by Franciscan nuns. Except, maybe because the term made people think of poor, hungry Oliver Twist, rats and dirt, abuse and neglect, they didn't call it "an orphanage"; they called it "a children's home."

An edited version of these reviews appeared in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Sunday, May 25, 2003.

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