Fiction

“A deeply moving and passionate book, Michael Potts’ End of Summer is a poignant literary novel about childhood and memory. This is contemporary Southern fiction at its best. In textured language and with heartfelt attention to detail, Potts’ nuanced portrayal of rural life in southern Appalachia and a young boy’s initial encounter with death reminds us that life at the economic margins can be culturally and spiritually rich, and that even as absences and losses sometimes damage us, these can also strengthen and redeem.”

“What girl doesn’t want to be surrounded by gorgeous jocks day in and day out? Jordan Woods isn’t just surrounded by hot guys, though–she leads them as the captain and quarterback of her high school football team. They all see her as one of the guys and that’s just fine. As long as she gets her athletic scholarship to a powerhouse university. But everything she’s ever worked for is threatened when Ty Green moves to her school. Not only is he an amazing QB, but he’s also amazingly hot. And for the first time, Jordan’s feeling vulnerable. Can she keep her head in the game while her heart’s on the line?”

“McLarey’s language transports you into a richly drawn environment where, even in 1988, whites and blacks are mostly still segregated, not by law but by history and comfort, and her diction drops you into the Deep South – where we identify both the illiterate and the educated through her intricate use of words.

“This fantasy interview is a smartly-rigged device for an extended rumination on the 60s/70s cultural sea change and the conflicting forces that both motivated and frustrated the artists of that era…Gardner is an intriguing, paradoxical character…he’s arrogant and self-deluded one moment, vulnerable and self-effacing the next—the standard bag of contradictions for any ‘tortured’ rock star.”