Ed Southern

PARLOUS ANGELS, by Ed Southern, is an utterly absorbing ride around and through the environs of Charlotte, North Carolina, of the last few decades, and even further back. And there's a bit of Winston-Salem ("At a Gypsy Camping Place") and even a pinch of Myrtle Beach ("At the End of Ocean Boulevard") in here too. In these eighteen loosely linked stories we meet piecemeal the Adams family, the Gardiners, the McCaskills and the Simmses, as well as other supporting players. The first story, "Primogeniture," introduces Will Adams, bound for college (Wake Forest) with dreams of being a writer, working a summer job driving a truck delivering and picking up heavy equipment parts for his father's business. As a fearful, skinny kid, he'd been called 'Billy," but now he is coming into his own. Eleven year-old Billy shows up in "Squirrel Hunting" with his Grandfather Gardiner. In a later story, "The Donnoha Beast," we meet Will's father Jim, still in high school, still 'Jaimie" to his family and friends,but already showing a marked level of maturity. "War Orphan," a distinctly disturbing story, gives us Joe and Stacia Simms, who have taken in her druggie sister's five year-old son, a devious, perhaps dangerous child. (I thought of the book and film, THE BAD SEED.) The McCaskill name first appears in "The Parlous Angel," with 'Mother McCaskill,' a rumored witch who came down out of the mountains years back, trailing thirteen children. The name next shows up in "The Postpunk Chronicles," which traces the life of Mary McCaskill, from her aimless, dropout life as a single mom to middle-class respectability, when she marries Will Adams (who has become poetry editor for a university press). People who grew up around Charlotte will no doubt recognize local venues like the Pterodactyl Club, which figures prominently here, as well as the names of many towns and counties that surround the spawling city.

My only trip to North Carolina was more than thirty years ago when my wife and I traveled from Maryland down through Chapel Hill to Asheville, where we visited the home of Thomas Wolfe. Nevertheless, I was quickly drawn into every one of these Charlotte stories. If I had to pick a favorite, it would probably be "The Death of John Gardiner," with Will Adams bringing his frail, aged grandfather back to the nursing home where he resides, after a Christmas visit with his family. Will witnesses the indignities of old age - wheelchairs, adult diapers and scoldings from nurses' aides - as he reflects back on his grandfather's life - as a turret gunner with the Air Corps in WWII, and a long successful business career. And now he is a shriveled husk of the man he'd once been. This story nearly brought me to tears.

'Parlous' means dangerous, or perilous. I have to admit I'm not at all sure what Ed Southern meant by his title. But it caught my attention. It sounds like the South, and Ed Southern certainly knows the South of his childhood and beyond. He is a damn fine writer, and I thoroughly enjoyed these stories. My very highest recommendation.

- Tim Bazzett, author of the memoir, BOOKLOVER… (mehr)