Shiner
A Novel
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
NAMED A BEST BOOK OF 2020 BY NPR
“Amy Jo Burns writes a version of Appalachia that is one step removed from magic – all strychnine and moonshine and powerful wonder.”—NPR
“[A] wrenching testament, told in language as incandescent as smoldering coal. . . This is not a despairing book, but a hopeful one, of Appalachian women taking back their life stories.” —New York Times Book Review
On a lush mountaintop trapped in time, two women vow to protect each other at all costs-and one young girl must defy her father to survive.
An hour from the closest West Virginia mining town, fifteen-year-old Wren Bird lives in a cloistered mountain cabin with her parents. They have no car, no mailbox, and no visitors-except for her mother's lifelong best friend. Every Sunday, Wren's father delivers winding sermons in an abandoned gas station, where he takes up serpents and praises the Lord for his blighted white eye, proof of his divinity and key to the hold he has over the community, over Wren and her mother.
But over the course of one summer, a miracle performed by Wren's father quickly turns to tragedy. As the order of her world begins to shatter, Wren must uncover the truth of her father's mysterious legend and her mother's harrowing history and complex bond with her best friend. And with that newfound knowledge, Wren can imagine a different future for herself than she has been told to expect.
Rich with epic love and epic loss, and diving deep into a world that is often forgotten but still part of America, Shiner reveals the hidden story behind two generations' worth of Appalachian heartbreak and resolve. Amy Jo Burns brings us a smoldering, taut debut novel about modern female myth-making in a land of men-and one young girl who must ultimately open her eyes.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In Burns's layered, evocative debut novel (after the memoir Cinderland), trauma and hope pass from mother to daughter in a West Virginia family. Wren Bird is the 15-year-old daughter of a one-eyed snake-handling preacher, Briar Bird, and his wife, Ruby Day. Superstitious, charismatic, and devoted to a wife who openly despises him, Briar forces his family to live isolated in the mountains, resulting in few chances for Ruby and Wren to interact with the people of Trap, the nearest town. Their only regular visitor is Ruby's childhood best friend, Ivy, whose deep connection with Ruby led her to settle with her family nearby. "It started with a burn," begins the novel Ivy visits Ruby and Wren one fateful day, and her dress and hair catch on fire. Briar heals her, with nary a scar, but when she starts calling Briar "White Eye," Ruby and Wren question what happened to Ivy. As Wren contends with the ramifications of her father's "miracle," she also begins to uncover the history behind his faith. Though the recursive structure stutters toward big reveals, making it difficult for readers to fully connect with any of the characters, Burns beautifully renders the isolated Appalachian landscape and the urgent desperation of her characters. Burns's stunning prose is reason enough to keep an eye out for this promising writer's next effort.
