The Handywoman Stories - Hardcover

Coberly, Lenore Mccomas

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0804010447 ISBN 13: 9780804010443

Publisher: Swallow Press, 2002

Synopsis

Sometimes it's possible to pick up a book and hear the words being spoken by the characters as if you were sitting across the table from them. This is the sensation you'll have as you read through The Handywoman Stories by Lenore McComas Coberly.

Whether the story describes the civil defense preparations of a small West Virginia town in World War II, the same town years later dealing with an influx of hippies, or the return of a woman to her roots after decades up north, the voices are convincing and true. “I nearly got kicked in the head by a cow before I learned that if you use your full strength pulling milk, you won’t get much milk,” says one. “To see Zevelda the way she was that Sunday is, well, not something you're very likely to see,” says another.

The Handywoman Stories themselves are driven by characters shaped by the place they have lived most all of their lives. They deal with economic depression, mine and war deaths, the arrogance of community leaders, and what might have been, but was not, a stultifying environment. Their tools are astonishing resourcefulness, steadfast friendship, and always humor.

Lenore McComas Coberly has woven together a bittersweet community of strong Appalachian women and men in this remarkable collection. Moving and joyful, these stories are made from the stuff of life.

About this title

About the Author

Lenore McComas Coberly grew up in Lincoln County, West Virginia. She is the author of The Handywoman Stories and the senior author of Writers Have No Age. Her poetry, essays, and stories have appeared in the Christian Science Monitor, Appalachian Journal, and other journals and in Wild Street Notes: Fifty Years of West Virginia Poetry, 1950-1999.

Reviews

Coberly taps into the lost tradition of rural storytelling in her uneven debut collection, consisting of 20 interlocking stories that capture the flavor of smalltown life in a series of West Virginia towns during WWII. The author is at her best when she applies her simple, homespun style to a solidly constructed plot, which she does most effectively in "Early Transparent," a story that outlines the tragic consequences of war as a young woman marries her second choice when her boyfriend goes off to war and is presumed dead after being captured in the Philippines. She also does several fine turns exploring other aspects of rural life, most notably in "The Fellowship at Wysong's Clearing," which describes the comic efforts of the town's denizens to deal with a group of nonconformists who arrive to homestead a patch of land outside of town. But Coberly's brevity gets the best of her in many of the shorter entries (some barely longer than a page), which have some nostalgic value as snapshots of the era but are far too incomplete to qualify as stories. "In Which Murder Is Done," for instance, finds a police officer putting his life in danger when he tries to help some abused children. Despite its compelling subject matter, it is woefully underdeveloped. Coberly wears her heart on her sleeve in virtually all of these yarns, and her earnest sense of compassion should appeal to readers seeking to explore country life in a difficult era.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Swallow Press
• Publication date: 2002
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0804010447
• ISBN 13: 9780804010443
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 192