Author: Wiley Cash
Publisher: William Morrow
Publication Date: April 2012 - Hardcover
Paperback - February 2013
ISBN: 978-0-06-208823-9
Book Description:
For a curious boy like Jess Hall, growing up in Marshall means trouble when your mother catches you spying on grown-ups. Adventurous and precocious, Jess is enormously protective of his older brother, Christopher, a mute whom everyone calls Stump. Though their mother has warned them not to snoop, Stump can't help sneaking a look at something he's not supposed to—an act that will have catastrophic repercussions, shattering both his world and Jess's. It's a wrenching event that thrusts Jess into an adulthood for which he's not prepared. While there is much about the world that still confuses him, he now knows that a new understanding can bring not only a growing danger and evil—but also the possibility of freedom and deliverance as well.
Told by three resonant and evocative characters—Jess; Adelaide Lyle, the town midwife and moral conscience; and Clem Barefield, a sheriff with his own painful past—A Land More Kind Than Home is a haunting tale of courage in the face of cruelty and the power of love to overcome the darkness that lives in us all.
Idgie Says:
I've never had dealings with snake handlers, but never trusted them either. Preachers that preach about being closer to God by waving a rattler in your face..........no thank you! Preachers that might not have any real qualifications other than a charismatic personality...they're not to be trusted.
Poor Jess and Stump, they're living a fairly everyday life in the rural South. Nothing too out of place. Then a snake handling charmer of a "preacher" shows up in town and papers up the windows of the building he picks for a church. The next thing you know women are falling on him, people are following his every direction, and things are going bad.
Jess and Stump see the Preacher up to no good one day. The preacher sees them seeing him. This can't be good.
The next thing you know there's big trouble in town and the Sheriff is hoping to stop it all before more horror and tears commence.
The ending is shocking and sad and regretted by all. A good read - I recommend it.
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Reviewed by Idgie. If you would like to have the Dew review a book, please contact me at dewonthekudzu@gmail.com