Conversations in the Car

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boys, children, dinosaurs, fathers, kindergarten, parenthood, parenting, sons, stegosaurus, Stephen Roth, summer, winter

“Daddy, do you wish that dinosaurs were still around today?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never really thought about it.”

“But if you thought about it, would you want them to still be around?”

“I don’t think so,” said the middle-aged man. “It would be kind of scary, having those big dinosaurs stomping all over the place.”

The little boy sighed, as if frustrated by always having to explain everything to his imagination-starved father. “But it would only be herbivores stomping around. No meat-eaters allowed.”

“Okay. Well, that makes me feel a little bit better.”

“What’s your favorite dinosaur?”

“Hmmm,” the man said, looking both ways before pulling onto the main road. It was a question he’d gotten a lot recently, so he should have been ready with an answer, but he wanted to come up with something flashier this time. “I’d have to say my favorite dinosaur is…the Stegosaurus.”

The boy giggled. “That can’t be your favorite dinosaur. That’s mine!”

“Why can’t we have the same favorite?”

“Because it was my favorite first,” he said. “I like how Stegosaurus has spikes on his tail, so he can use it against his predators.”

The father nodded, having seen his son demonstrate a Stegosaurus “tail sweep” more than a few times in the downstairs TV room.

The child looked out the window at the beige winter landscape. “Daddy, do I have to go to school today?”

“Yes, you do.”

“I wish it were summer already.”

The dad chuckled, thinking how the swimming pool would open in just three short months, which would have seemed like an eternity back when he was in Kindergarten.

“It’ll be here before you know it,” he said, trying to sound hopeful.

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A Book Club for Pridemore

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a plot for pridemore, amazon, mercer university press, missouri, southern fiction, Stephen Roth

Over the past few months, I have been delighted to speak with a couple of book clubs that took the time to read A Plot for Pridemore. The most recent engagement was conducted via conference call with a friend’s club in North Carolina. The ladies drank wine and peppered me with questions about the book while I paced around my basement trying to summon intelligent-sounding answers. As far as Saturday night conference calls go, it was a lot of fun, and I was flattered that the book club would want to talk with me about my novel.

If you have a book club, or are thinking about starting one, let me provide you with five compelling reasons why A Plot for Pridemore would be an excellent selection:

1. The book is funny.

2. The plot is fast-moving and engaging.

3. The characters are colorful.

4. There are some dark, chilling moments that should spark interesting conversation next time your club gets together.

5. I would be happy to talk with your group about my book, whether you are in Kansas City or Kathmandu. Obviously, if you are based in Nepal, we might have to converse over the phone.

These books aren’t going to sell themselves.

Want to know what the book’s about? Here’s a summary:

For five heart-churning days, the world turns its attention to tiny Pridemore, Missouri, where rescue teams work around the clock to free a mentally challenged man from a collapsed cave.

That’s how Mayor Roe Tolliver envisions it, anyway. Weary of watching the town he’s led for more than forty years slide into economic oblivion, the mayor hatches a devious and dangerous plan-trap a local man in the bowels of nearby Dragon’s Ice House cavern, start a massive rescue operation, and prompt a media vigil that puts Pridemore on the map for decades to come.

Over the course of a year, the mayor and his cronies carry out the convoluted scheme, which involves everything from bilking state money for a bogus tourist attraction to hiring a militia “ballistics consultant” to detonate the limestone cavern. Their success hinges on unassuming pawn Digby Willers, whose simple-minded likeability provides human interest in the made-for-television crisis. As events unfold, however, forces beyond even the mayor’s control turn Digby’s rescue into a real, life-or-death drama.

Get ready for a fast-paced romp filled with quirky characters, hilarious twists and turns, and a small town that just might get its fifteen minutes of fame.

You can find more information about A Plot for Pridemore on the Mercer University Press website, as well as Amazon. If you’re interested in reading the book with your club, please send me a comment and let me know.

Book Review: Serena

Tags

1930s, gone girl, literary fiction, north carolina, ron rash, serena, southern fiction

Ron Rash’s Serena artfully captures the beauty and brutality of life in the Smoky Mountains in the early 1930s. The novel provides historical perspective on the clash between business interests and environmentalism that still runs hot today.

However, the real force of nature in Serena is the book’s namesake, a woman whose ambition and cruelty mow over rivals just as swiftly as her husband’s logging company takes down hardwoods in the mountains outside Waynesville, North Carolina.

There is a scene early in the novel that indicates just how formidable a character Serena Pemberton will be. It’s the end of another long day at the Boston Logging Company. George Pemberton, his new bride and his business partners are relaxing with a few drinks. At this point in the story, Serena has already humbled her husband’s abandoned lover. Her courage and toughness have won the respect of the working men in the logging camp. But the company’s managers are not impressed with George Pemberton’s young wife—it is the 1930s, after all. The camp physician, Doc Cheney, mirthfully praises Serena for being unusually logical for the “the fairer sex.”

Serena gives the doctor a cutting response.

“My husband tells me that you are from these very mountains, a place called Wild Hog Gap,” Serena said to Cheney. “Obviously, your views on my sex were formed by the slatterns you grew up with, but I assure you the natures of women are more various than your limited experience allows.”

If you think Serena is striking a blow for women’s rights, you might want to hold your applause until the book’s end. Doc Cheney and many others will soon learn that Serena transcends any gender, that she may even be a creature of mythical powers.

I saw Ron Rash speak at a book conference in 2014. He said then that his creative process involves many, many rewrites—sometimes 20 to 30 revisions of a single short story. That craftsmanship and attention to detail pay off in Serena, which combines beautiful prose with vivid characters and a suspenseful, harrowing plot.

In Serena Pemberton, Rash has created an epic persona of uncompromising villainy. If you thought that Amy Dunne in Gone Girl was frightening, you really should check out Serena.

You Have No Idea

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awkward photos, cats, internet, media, pet photos

You have no idea how demeaning this is for both of us.

How, after 12 years, our companionship is now winnowed
down to one ill-advised portrait for all the World Wide Web to ridicule.

We have both seen better days.

Your eyes bear the toll of three failed marriages, two home foreclosures,
and countless hours of screeching at The Real Housewives of Orange County.
My girth betrays Fancy Feasts, Friskies, and full days sunning myself
beneath the bay window of our townhouse apartment.

“C’mon, Winston!” you bellowed, gathering me in your arms to pose before the camera carefully placed atop the liquor cabinet. “Don’t you want to get famous?”

I didn’t, but now I am, in a perverse kind of way.

At least smile, dammit, if you’re going to expose us like this.

Your Official Drinking Game for the 2016 Super Bowl

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beyonce, bud bowl, carolina panthers, coldplay, denver broncos, national football league, NFL, peyton manning, roger goodell, Super Bowl

• For each player who has been arrested on the night before the big game, take a drink.

• For each shot of a head coach pacing the sidelines in his officially licensed team gear, headphones and haircut, take a drink.

• For every mention of “The coveted Lombardi Trophy,” take a drink.

• Each time a beer commercial features an adult male getting hurt or humiliated, take a drink.

• When the camera pans in on a pale, grey-haired team owner and his trophy wife peering down at the game from their luxury box, take a drink.

• When the camera shows Roger Goodell in his luxury box, take a drink, take a knee and say a quick prayer thanking your Creator that you have year-round media coverage of the NFL to look forward to for the rest of your life.

• Each time the announcers speculate on whether or not this will be Peyton Manning’s final game, take a drink.

• Take a drink each time Peyton Manning cries out “Omaha!”

• Take a drink each time Peyton Manning throws an interception. Take two drinks if it is a “pick-six.”

• Whenever the color analyst mentions “good penetration,” “red zone,” or “taking it to the hole,” take a drink and exchange a knowing smirk with your significant other.

• For every commercial featuring horses, babies or puppy dogs, take a drink and keep a Kleenex handy to dab the grateful tears from your eyes.

• This year’s halftime entertainment will be Coldplay, Beyonce, and a “special guest.” If that secret performer turns out to be U2, slam the rest of your drink. If it turns out to be Taylor Swift, slam your drink and the drink of the person sitting next to you.

• For every commercial making a “statement” about a Serious National Concern like child obesity or rickets or binge drinking, take a drink and complain about how you don’t need to be reminded of this shit during the Super Bowl.

• Take a drink each time someone in the room reminisces fondly about the Bud Bowl.

• When the celebratory cooler of Gatorade is dumped on the winning head coach, take one drink if the liquid looks orange, and two drinks if it has more of a reddish tint.

• After the game and the locker room interviews and the post-game analysis, take two Advils and maybe take a walk around your neighborhood in the brisk night air. Tomorrow’s a working day, and you’ve got to be up by six in the morning.