Floodmarkers
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
The residents of a North Carolina town weather Hurricane Hugo, and other kinds of storms, in this “smart and funny” collection of linked stories (Daniel Wallace, author of Big Fish).
The days leading up to the impending disaster are not at all unusual—no portents, no signs of impending calamity. Bryce works his night shift at the hot dog factory, Isaac drives the bus to school, Evelyn attends a funeral. But when the electricity fails in the middle of the night on September 21, 1989, it marks the moment when everything will change: Hugo has arrived.
The storm builds, the wind whips by faster and faster, and interpersonal dramas, grudges, and rivalries are dredged up along with the flotsam and debris. Meanwhile, flood markers, painted red, track the height of the water from past rainstorms, and as the creek level rises higher than ever before, so do the emotions of the townspeople. Floodmarkers has us look bravely at the eye of the storm, as acclaimed author Nic Brown shows us that human nature can stir up a spectacular tempest all its own.
“Stories starring lovable slackers and beautiful failures . . . on my List of Favorite Books, right after The Moviegoer and just before Cathedral. Smart and funny and sexy.” —Daniel Wallace, author of Big Fish
“Reminiscent of Sherwood Anderson’s Winesburg, Ohio in both its structure and its tragi–comedic view of a small town . . . his empathy and insight into the human condition is breathtaking.” —Jonathan Ames, author of You Were Never Really Here
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In Brown's hip, assured debut, a series of vignettes adds up to a keen portrait of a small North Carolina town. It's September 21, 1989, in Lystra, N.C., and Hurricane Hugo is bearing down on residents and visitors alike, including shy Tennessean Cliff, in town for the wedding of his cousin, with whom he had a tender, confusing adolescent affair; high school girls Grier and Fletcher, best friends and rivals for the affection of Fletcher's brother, the be-mohawked Mike; Evelyn Graham, for whom "funerals were social events whose invitations were printed in The News & Observer obituaries"; and Pat Doublehead, a Cherokee veterinarian with an eye for little boys. Brown, a former journeyman musician, slides easily between his characters, rendering them in believable relief, from Cliff's romanticism to Fletcher's calm competence in an emergency. Though none of the players gets much time on stage the novel is short and the character list long Brown makes the most of them, revealing their secrets and tragedies with careful, confident economy. Think Winesburg, Ohio simultaneously pared down and amped up, read to the sound of a jangly Strat.
