MUSING APPALACHIA

If you were raised in the backhills of Appalachia, you already know the region has a high ratio of screwballs and everyday garden-variety nutjobs...the kind you sometimes find at church potlucks and family reunions. I was blessed with more than a few eccentric kinfolks who made growing up in Appalachia an adventure. While some might beat you with a crowbar and quote scripture while doing it, others were just run-of- the-mill granny women, moonshiners, preachers, healers, or strong-willed women. Most, though, were laid back, quiet and...funny.

This book is a collection of often-outrageous short stories straight from the hills of Appalachia. It is full of colorful characters, hilarious asides, and tales almost too unbelievable to be true...but I write about real people, with just enough embellishment to make them sound more "normal." You will laugh and wish you had known these characters and experienced their adventures firsthand.

Musing Appalachia Volume 2 is a compilation of forty-six comical but true stories about the lives and customs of Appalachians and their experiences while making the often-painful transition of being absorbed into a culture outside the hills.

Topics touch on humorous adaptations and traditions as they grapple to cope with the new environment. They include searching for identity, schooling, marriage and sex, religion, nicknames, Appalachian creativity, moonshining, hunting, race, the War of Northern Aggression, etc.

A few of the 46 stories include Where I Come From, Roots Run Deep; Jijadzilla, My First Grade Reality Teacher; Stuff Momma Told Me; Mules Taught Me to Cuss; Dixie Whupped the Worst Out of Us; Art, Creativity, and Buttocks Baskets; Strange People; Enduring Poverty; Bootlegger Turns, A Shotgun Sobered Them; Dynamite: Better than Firecrackers; Reverend John Elbert, Mountain Preacher; plus thirty-one more stories. 271 pages.

Once read, the reader should have had a more relaxed perspective on Appalachian ways and how they came to where they are today.