Above the Waterfall

by Ron Rash

Les, a long-time sheriff nearing retirement, contends with the ravages of poverty and crystal meth in his small Appalachian town. Nestled in a beautiful hollow of the Appalachians, his is a tight-knit community rife with secrets and suspicious of outsiders.

Becky, a park ranger, arrives in this remote patch of North Carolina hoping to ease the anguish of a harrowing past. Searching for tranquility amid the verdant stillness, she finds solace in poetry and the splendor of the land.

A vicious crime will plunge both sheriff and ranger into deep and murky waters, forging an unexpected bond between them. Caught in a vortex of duplicity, lies, and betrayal, they must navigate the dangerous currents of a tragedy that turns neighbor against neighbor—and threatens to sweep them all over the edge.

Genres: Fiction, Mystery, Literary Fiction, Southern, Audiobook, Poetry, Contemporary

252 pages, Hardcover

First published October 7, 2014

About the author

Ron Rash is the author of the 2009 PEN/Faulkner Finalist and New York Times bestselling novel, Serena, in addition to three other prizewinning novels, One Foot in Eden, Saints at the River, and The World Made Straight; three collections of poems; and four collections of stories, among them Burning Bright, which won the 2010 Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award, and Chemistry and Other Stories, which was a finalist for the 2007 PEN/Faulkner Award. Twice the recipient of the O.Henry Prize, he teaches at Western Carolina University.

Reviews

[Will Byrnes · Rating 5 out of 5]

All we seen is hard trials and sorrows. I’d not deny it. Burdens are plenty in this world and they can pull us down in the lamentation. But the good Lord knows we need to see at least the hem of the robe of glory, and we do. Ponder a pretty sunset or the dogwoods all ablossom. Every time you see such it’s the hem of the robe of glory. Brothers and sisters, how do you expect to see what you don’t seek? Some claim heaven has streets of gold and all such things, but I hold a different notion. When we’re there, we’ll say to the angels, why, a lot of heaven’s glory was in the place we come from. And you know what them angels will say? They’ll say yes, pilgrim, and how often did you notice? What did you seek?

How loud the sound of a fear-formed tear? How long the sorrow from a thoughtless wrong? The past. It informs, shapes, bolsters, damages, inspires, depresses and often defines who we are, who we become. In Ron Rash’s latest novel, Above the Waterfall, characters struggle with their past. William Faulkner famously said, “The past is never dead. It's not even past.” The past is indeed never finished with us until we’re done. It can no more be finished than our blood. It picks up nutrients there, drops them here, carries disease and defense, history, legacy and possibility. Is the past a medium or a message, a means or a purpose? Maybe the past gathers until enough force has been amassed and it breaks through the dam that has governed its power, spilling into the present.

Becky Shytle is a forty-something with deep scars from a childhood trauma and a dodgy history of more recent vintage. She was only a school kid in Virginia when a shooter left a trail of carnage that included her teacher. Becky became mute for so long that her parents sent her away to stay with her grandparents. It was while there that she was introduced to the beauty of nature, seeing in the natural landscape a form of salvation from her terrors.

I had not spoken since the day of the shooting. Then one day in July, my grandparents’ neighbor nodded at the ridge gap and said watershed. I’d followed the creek upstream, thinking wood and tin over a spring, found instead a granite rock face shedding water. I’d touched the wet slow slide, touched the word itself, like the girl named Helen that Ms. Abernathy told us about, whose first word gushed from a well pump.

And now, a state ranger at Locust Creek Park, she continues to find sustenance in nature, her spirit still trying to heal as it bonds with the beauty in the world. (I’m not autistic, she’d told me later, I just spent a lot of my life trying to be.) It is in Becky’s portions of the novel that Rash best joins his prose with poetry to create an eyes-rolling-back-into-one’s-head, toes-curling work of literary ecstasy.


Freight Car at Truro by Edward Hopper - from Wikiart
On first seeing this in Les’s office Becky notes “Even Hopper’s boxcars are alone”

Becky feels she can share what she sees in the woods and fields with Les, a kindred spirit. Les is the sheriff in a small Appalachian town, three weeks from trading his gold star for a gold watch after thirty years on the force. He’s a decent man but carries the weight of a critical mistake he had made with his wife and a debt from his youth that he had never repaid. Becky and Les are friends, at least. They share an appreciation for the glory of nature. Les chose to build his retirement house where he did, for example, because of the view he expects to spend considerable time painting.

Above the Waterfall is organized into more or less alternating chapters, his and hers. Les’s perspective is presented in a traditional narrative, but Becky’s take on things is heavily poetic. She mentions early on favoring the poetry of Gerard Manley Hopkins, a man who wrote much on the beauty to be found in nature. And while Hopkins may have been looking for Jesus in the natural world, Becky is looking for peace without, necessarily, Hopkins’ religious associations.

The story centers on an assault, not on people, but on nature itself. At least in appearance. Gerald Blackwelder is in his 70s and owns a piece of land that abuts what is now a fishing resort that features a considerable stock of trout above the waterfall of the title. Someone dumped kerosene into the water, killing the fish, and harming business at the resort. The unpleasant owner of the complex is sure that old man Gerald is to blame and pressures the sheriff to arrest him. Les is not so sure. And Becky, who feels for Gerald as if he were her own grandfather, is certain he is innocent.


Ron Rash

CJ is a local from a particularly impoverished background who had toughed it out, gotten past his familial disadvantages to become a man of substance in town, working now as an assistant to the resort owner. He carries with him the scars of his past, physical as well as emotional. The past of all four characters threatens to come cascading down when a sequence of seemingly unrelated events brings them together.

The town is home to some folks in the meth production and consumption business, which gives the sheriff something to do and avenues to investigate for a rash of local crimes. The depiction of Appalachian meth users is chilling. Les does his investigative due diligence and the story of his figuring out just what is what is indeed interesting. But that is not where the glory in this book resides.

There are several items you might keep an eye on throughout the novel. Silence comes in for considerable attention. Not only Becky’s muteness, but pondering what silence looks like, Les’s silence in not speaking up to correct a costly error when he was young, among other mentions. Mental health issues recur a fair bit, from Becky’s PTSD to Les’s wife’s depression, to whatever it is that makes a meth addict, to some household violence in Les’s family tree. If you are a young shrink looking for plentiful business you could do worse than to set up shop here. Water references pervade. Sometimes it is just something wet, but more than likely, given the subtext, there is more to this water than something to drink, a pretty stream or a place to cast your line. Maybe a connection, a flow between being and not. And of course, there are trout.

Trout have to live in a pure environment unlike human beings; they can’t live in filth! And so I think there is a kind of wonder; to me, they’re incredibly beautiful creatures. I can remember being only four or five and staring for long periods at them, just watching them swimming in the water. But also, like Faulkner in “The Bear,” the idea that when such creatures disappear, we have lost something that cannot be brought back. And I think this is what McCarthy is getting at, at the end of The Road. They mean many things: beauty, wonder, and fragility, in the sense that they can be easily destroyed. - from the Transatlantica interview

But the big catch here is the application of Gerard Manley Hopkins to contemporary Appalachia. His work pervades the novel. References to his poems are many, sometimes overt, sometimes popping up in the arcane words he favored. I would urge you to read this short novel through once, take a bit of a side trip to Hopkins, (I have provided tickets to that boat in EXTRA STUFF below) then read it again. There is a lot going on that may evade your hook on the first cast. But in case you opt to leave your tackle in the box, a bit of a short look.

You may have come across Hopkins’s main chestnut, Spring and Fall, in an English class at some point in your elementary school education. A young girl is saddened by the fall of autumn leaves, seeing, but not understanding that she sees her own demise and the demise of all in nature’s annual shedding. Hopkins, who not only converted to Catholicism, but became a Jesuit priest, looks through the tinted lens of nature in seeking the eternal. In a way this is what Becky does, and the language in which her chapters are written is suffused with the spirit, sound and feel of Hopkins’s poetry. If methworld is a hellish place, the flight of birds, stars tacked in place in a light-pollution-free sky, sun setting and a silver birch glows like a tuning fork struck offer the opposite. Birds seem to pull Becky. One even alights on her. What does that portend? Here is a taste of a Becky chapter, in fact, the opening chapter of the book, using some of the forms Hopkins was fond of.

Though sunlight tinges the mountains, black leather-winged bodies swing low. First fireflies blink languidly. Beyond this meadow, cicadas rev and slow like sewing machines. All else ready for night except night itself. I watch last light lift off level land. Ground shadows seep and thicken. Circling trees form banks. The meadow itself becomes a pond filling, on its surface dozens of black-eyed susans.

Ron Rash’s novels have a fair bit of darkness to them. There is a fair bit of optimism here, despite the challenges his characters face, and some of the less appealing goings on in the setting.

One thing I want to do is for landscape and my characters to be inextricably bound together. I believe the landscape people live in has to affect their psychology...This…novel is…about wonder, about how nature might sustain us. I wanted to look at the world a little more hopefully. – from the Transatlantica interview

Most writers would be happy to have written one masterpiece in their career. Serena is certainly that. But, with Above the Waterfall, Ron Rash has produced a second. There is a golden inner glow to Ron Rash's literary world. He uses words to scrape away the covering crust so we can spy what lies inside. It is a beautiful landscape to behold.

Review first posted – 9/4/15

Publication date – 9/8/15

=============================EXTRA STUFF

Reviews of other Ron Rash books
-----Burning Bright
-----Nothing Gold Can Stay
-----The Cove
-----Serena

Rash does not, so far as I can tell, have a facebook page. But his son, James, set up a Fan Club FB page for him.

June 6, 2017 - I was alerted by GR friend Linda to the following from April 2017 - WCU's Ron Rash wins Guggenheim Fellowship - Rash deserves all the recognition there is, he is a national treasure.

Here is the Poetry Foundation’s bio of Rash, who, after beginning his writing life with short stories, spent about ten years focusing on poetry, and has published several volumes. His skill as a poet is eminently clear in …Waterfall

This is the Poetry Foundation’s page for Gerard Manley Hopkins

A wonderful article that explains Hopkins’ poem, The Windhover, which is mentioned in Above the Waterfall

There is a cornucopia of intel on Hopkins in this Sparknotes piece

Interviews with the author
-----TINGE Magazine – by Jeremy Hauck and Kevin Basl
-----SouthernScribe.com - by Pam Kingsbury
-----Transatlantica - by Frédérique Spill
-----Wall Street Journal - by Ellen Gamerman - Thanks to Linda for cluing us in to this one.

[karen · Rating 4 out of 5]

i was so excited to get this book at BEA - it was one of my four MUST-haves. while we were waiting in line for it, greg asked me what it was about. i just shrugged. "meth? appalachia? i don't care - it's ron rash!" and then i opened it up and hey! meth! appalachia!! who would have guessed!?

this is on my grit lit shelf, but it's on the end of the grit lit spectrum where there is little emphasis on the drugs and violence. the grit here doesn't scour, it just sort of buffs a little. very few grit lit novels will open with such poetically alliterative descriptions:

Though sunlight tinges the mountains, black leather-winged bodies swing low. First fireflies blink languidly. Beyond this meadow, cicadas rev and slow like sewing machines. All else ready for night except night itself. I watch last light lift off level land. Ground shadows seep and thicken. Circling trees form banks. The meadow itself becomes a pond filling, on its surface dozens of black-eyed susans.

there are definitely scenes in which meth causes bad things to occur, but this is a more meditative book, as les, a north carolina sheriff in his last three weeks on the job, is confronted with just one more case. and you know how that always goes. it's never a parking ticket. this last case involves no car chases or shoot-em-ups; it concerns the poisoning of a trout population at a fishing resort. i know - michael bay says "pass." but there is also a meth bust, so there's still some action elements.

the story is told in alternating chapters between les and becky shytle, a park ranger who is also a poet (with a deep respect for gerard manley hopkins). becky's chapters are comprised of lyrical passages and bits of her poetry, usually celebrating nature and the land around her. her slower-paced chapters contrast with les' choppier, more dialogue-driven ones and provide a natural backdrop to the crime story in which she is tangentially involved. she is also tangentially involved with les himself, in a slow-burning courtship that their own personal damage has stalled with caution. the two of them have well-developed backstory, but it is becky's that stands out on account of how unusual it is and how scarring it has been for her.

les' backstory is more common, especially for men in his profession - a marriage failing in a horrible way. but his memories of the early years with his wife are beautifully written, which elevates it from most books about failed marriages. les is neither a perfect man nor a corrupt sheriff. he is completely human; he's made mistakes and has occasionally taken advantage of situations, but essentially he is a good man who wants the best for his community. having grown up in the town he now oversees, he knows these people and their pasts, he knows their weaknesses and when to let minor offenses slide. he is also subject to the pressures and obligations to people who were once friends and are now caught up in very bad things because of where circumstance have led them; circumstances in which les has unwittingly played a part.

les' struggle is with finding that middle ground between the law and ethics, when neither one of those value systems are capable of satisfying the nuanced and flexible factors of situational justice. it's about extenuating circumstances and atonement - les is not a man playing god, but a man who recognizes that some situations require solutions outside of the law or ordinary morality.

it's a quiet book, full of beautiful natural imagery and the sense of an ending - of tying up loose ends and setting things in order; leaving the campsite better than you found it before receding into a much-deserved retirement. in a way, it feels slight - more of a snack than a meal, but ron rash's snacks are incredibly satisfying. maybe not the best starting point into his oeuvre, but if you're already a fan, this will sustain your appreciation.

come to my blog!

[Elyse Walters · Rating 3 out of 5]

Audiobook.....
It could be just me - probably is...but I was bored as often as I was interested-
The writing is beautiful- and often the dialogue kept me very interested- but other times I drifted away with the lovely descriptions themselves.
“ The sound of water moving over smooth stones”.....for example, is beautiful - yet I wasn’t really feeling anything.
I knew the sheriffs ex-wife was depressed....but I never felt I knew her. I wanted to feel empathy.
Becky had a traumatic childhood experience, but I never felt I really knew her either.
Her poetry was beautiful- but again —� my problem is I didn’t feel much intimacy.

The two different voices used in the audiobook were good —each very distinct....but mostly —� but I’m not convinced Ron Rash is an author for me.

I do own a few other of his books - The Risen- Serena- and The Cove ...( books given to me)....and I’ll try one more....’sometime’.....but this novel was honestly just ok for me.

2.5 Stars. —�- sorry....I just was only so-so interested!

[Barbara · Rating 4 out of 5]

4

Ron Rash knows the mountains of North Carolina. He knows the flora, the fauna, the people. He understands the cathartic power of the landscape, the dire impact of poverty and addiction. Every description exudes his insight.

Les is a sheriff about to retire from a small, tight-knit mountain community. Becky, new to the area, is a park ranger dedicated to preserving nature, caring for the environment and passing that love on to children. The story is told by them in alternating chapters; two good people fighting demons from their past.

Where there are mountains there are streams and in those streams, those clear, cool waters, are fish, fish for recreation and sustenance. When those waters are poisoned, the source must be found. Like the streams, small towns may be tainted, too. A sheriff can only do so much.

Rash masterfully portrays this town and its people with unusual authenticity. From the beauty of a babbling brook to the weedy trash-filled yard of a drug house, the tranquility of the landscape to the heartbreak of families devastated by addiction, these disparate scenes are all too common realities, but rarely are they represented so well.

The author has received book awards, but the Booker, the Pulitzer will most likely never be given to him. Yet, he is a fine writer. His characters are fascinating, his stories compelling. This was only my second Rash book, but I anticipate reading them all. I know I won’t be disappointed.

[Zoeytron · Rating 3 out of 5]

Dueling POVs from Sheriff Les and Park Ranger Becky. The sheriff knows better than to put too much faith in justice, he's seen too much. Sometimes the right thing to do is in direct contradiction with what the law dictates. Becky is emotionally scarred from a traumatic childhood incident. She has a pure love of nature and revels in being a part of it, it soothes her soul.

The end result for me came across as a tasty course of meat and potatoes that was inexplicably served with an exotic side dish of edible flowers. I get the ugliness of reality playing off the beauty of nature, but felt each diluted the other.

[Sue · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is my first venture into Ron Rash territory. The combination of a plot composed of conflicted, damaged and well written characters, incredibly descriptive prose alternating with actual poetry, and a story that, though set in the American South, could be moved elsewhere with small changes...has made me an instant fan.

Rash has combined stories of small town corruptions--crystal meth's inroads and the crimes that come with it, the individual "turning of the head" of an otherwise seemingly honest public official, a local business man who surrounds himself with armed bodyguards--with stories of fragility--a woman survivor of a childhood nightmare, an old man struggling without the son he loved and ornery to the rest of the world. And behind and beyond them is the natural world, struggling to maintain itself in the face of man's onslaught.

Becky, the fragile survivor, tells her story partly in poetry and thinks frequently of the Lascaux cave paintings and Hopkins' poetry. She is a Park ranger and respects land and nature. Les, the Sheriff, about to retire, is not fragile, but has his own fault lines below the surface.

Into this stew there are crimes and insinuations, threats and promises. Through it all the writing is wonderful.

A mown hay field appears, its blond stubble
blackened by a flock of starlings. As I pass, the field
seems to lift, peek to see what's under itself, then
resettle. A pickup passes from the other direction.
The flock lifts again and this time keeps rising, a
narrow swirl as if sucked through a pipe and then an
unfurl of rhythm sudden sprung, becoming one entity
as it wrinkles, smooths out, drifts down like a
snapped bedsheet. Then swerves and shifts, gathers and
twists. Murmuration: ornithology's word-poem for what
I see. Two hundred starlings at most, but in Europe
sometimes ten thousand, enough to punctuate a sky.
What might a child see? A magic carpet made suddenly real?
Ocean fish-schools swimming air? The flock turns west and
disappears. (p 104)

Here are a couple of themes that recur throughout the book--observing the world of nature and seeing the world through the eyes of a child (while also perhaps trying to preserve some of it for future children).

I do recommend this book strongly.

[Cathrine ☯️ · Rating 5 out of 5]

5★
In an interview with Jack Shuler for the South Carolina Review Ron Rash was commenting on his two formats—prose and poetic, and stated “When I write one, I can't do the other, explaining that the two forms seem to come to him on different frequencies. Yet One Foot in Eden began as a poem and just kept growing.”
This one also must be considered a successful blend of the two and was sublime reading for me. I savored every page, truly. I think it was written for kindred spirits such as myself.
Also discussed, was a favorite theme of his—“things that are vanishing or gone, southern lifestyles that are fading out of existence. To balance these themes of impermanence, Rash also uses natural metaphors, such as a blade of grass or a waterfall, things that will be understood by a reader two hundred years from now, because nature is universal.”

From the body of his work, this one has garnered mostly less than enthusiastic reviews from my GR friends so I was not expecting my response. I can understand why some were not so smitten and even though I am besotted with his talent, I have previously bestowed 5 stars on his short story collections only—until now.

“Last week I brought the children to the meadow. How many different things can you see? At first, only three—tree, grass, flower. Then as they moved around the meadow—actually seeing—over a hundred before they left.”

I loved it so much I’m going to read it again because even though I tried to catch it all I know I missed hidden treasures. It can be read quickly on a superficial level or the depths can be explored and appreciated.
I want to move again through the pages and find them—see more.

[Diane S ☔ · Rating 4 out of 5]

A rather simple plot compared to many of Rash's other books but filled with memorable characters nevertheless. Becky, her story is written in a kind of surreal style. She has had a tragic past, but is now the ranger at the National Forest and is the friend of an old landowner. C. J. came back to town to take a job and now finds that the job has disappeared, leaving him without support for his wife and sons. Barry, a young police officer who quits after a nasty meth bust. Can no longer bear to look at the damage and the worst that people can do to each other. And a sheriff, good friends with Becky, due to retire in a matter of days.

Rash's real genius, however, is in painting a picture of the landscape that is both beautiful and poignant. Every little detail, nothing too small escapes his notice. The love of land that he imparts to many of his characters. Simply wonderful.

Alternately he wrote one of the most in your face view of a meth addict, how they live, how little they care about anything but the drug. Such a stark contrast to the beautiful setting of the Blue Ridge Mountains.

So many great quotes I could copy but this small line just touched me.
"As the storm moves on, rain trickles off the leaves like an afterthought." Simple but lovely.

ARC from publisher

[Andrew Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Becky has mental scars. In her youth a man entered her Virginia school and went to work with a rifle. Amongst the victims was her teacher. Now she’s a State Ranger at Locust Creek Park in the Appalachians, where she marvels at the nature that surrounds her every day and which sometimes inspires her to write poetry. She also tends for the needs of a septuagenarian named Gerald who owns a plot of land that abuts the park. Les has tragedy in his past too, in his case it was the loss of his son who went off to war and never came back. Then there’s the local sheriff, Les, who is a few weeks from early retirement. He intends to live in a spot he’s picked out for himself and paint the wonderful views he’ll be afforded. Les fights his demons too, he believes he failed to understand his wife’s depression and was responsible for her attempted suicide. And finally there is CJ, a boy who survived a tough upbringing and made good. He now works for the owner of the park. CJ saved Les from a serious accident with a baling machine many years back – an act Les feels he’s never truly thanked him for.

Les and Becky have a relationship… of sorts. It’s not fully bloomed and it’s not clear that it ever will. There are tensions surrounding the park involving Gerald and the CJ’s boss. Gerald has a habit of wondering onto park land and is suspected of poaching fish. CJ is tasked with resolving this issue and seeks support from his old pal, the sheriff. As the story plays out, old friendships and perceived debts battle with each other to gain prominence.

The narrative is laid out, alternately, from the perspective of Becky and Les. Becky’s sections are poetic and sometimes fragmented. We get the story form Les in a more conventional way. I found this off-putting to start with but once I settled into the flow I found the contrast interesting and and it really is all beautifully written. There’s a lot here about the grimmer side of life in this unnamed town – it’s a pretty dark tale. But soon there is also a mystery to be solved and the dramatic tension steadily increases.

It’s a highly atmospheric piece and, in the end, totally absorbing. I’d been wanting to read a book by Ron Rash for some time and I’m pleased I tracked one down at last. He’s certainly a class act and I’ll spend time with more of his work sometime soon.

My thanks to Canongate Books and NetGalley for providing a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

[Margitte · Rating 5 out of 5]

Between heaven and hell on earth, the community of Mist Creek Valley battle out the challenges of everyday life.

You can see heaven all around us, Preacher Waldrop claimed. But Mist Creek Valley would soon confirm that the same was true of hell.

Les, the soon-to-be-retired sheriff, made two mistakes in his life that would drive him to do irrational things to make things right while time permits. He has three weeks before he retires and move into his new cabin where he will spend the rest of his his days growing his organic vegetables. There was no symbioses between himself and love for many years. If online honesty was paramount, he must brutaly profess his biggest sin:

" Man who encouraged clinically depressed wife to kill herself seeks woman, traumatized by school shooting, who later lived with ecoterrorist bomber.

Becky Shytle lost her voice as a young girl during a school shooting in which her beloved teacher lost her life. She tried to act autistic until the wonder of nature ignited the meaning of life in her again.

In alternating chapters, these two main characters share their history with the readers, while their daily activities force them to fully participate in their community and make a difference. She works as a state ranger in Locust Creek. Les is tying up the lose ends of a long career. He is fifty-one-years-old. Becky is in her early forties. He paints, and she writes poetry. Both have a dedication to the third most important character in the book: the natural environment feeding the tourism industry in their town.

When integrity, loyalty, honor and reality collide, there is hardly any heaven to be found. Not when betrayal, lies and dysfunction force a community into disarray. Yet, the magic of their environment force them to acknowledge heaven on earth and do the right thing although it does not always comply with legislation.

The extensive blurb blow this novel into the literary genre and scare off many readers. That's my humble opinion. If I have read the blurb before reading it, I would probably not have done so. But the book came highly recommended and I wanted it to be a surprise. If you enjoyed Kent Haruf and Erskine Caldwell's masterful portrayal of American realism, you will enjoy Ron Rash as well. The blurb describes it as a haunting tale set in contemporary Appalachia. I agree.

A true masterpiece. Definitely one of the best reads this year.

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Perhaps not my favorite Ron Rash, but that's kind of like saying "Well, it wasn't my favorite trip to Paris". It's still a trip to Paris, which means it's pretty damn good.

With themes of The Secret Wisdom of the Earth and A Land More Kind Than Home, Rash tells the tale of a local Sheriff on the verge of retirement, land rights, environmental damage, and the plague of drug addiction. Each character with a back story.

More than in any of his other books, he also writes so beautifully about the natural world, I just have to stop and catch my breath. It's all right there if you just stop and look.

"Last week I brought the children to the meadow. How many different things can you see? At first, only three -- tree, grass, flower. Then as they moved around the meadow -- actually seeing -- over a hundred before they left. As I step out of the meadow after they leave I hear a crunch. Cicada sluff. What a gift! To shed one's old self so easily."

3.5 stars

[Connie G · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ron Rash has written an atmospheric novel of guilt and redemption set in the Appalachian Mountains of North Carolina. The sheriff, Les, is a bit of a loner haunted by his failed marriage to a woman he could not help. He has a relationship with Becky, a park ranger, who had been traumatized by a harrowing school shooting as a child as well as experiences with an eco-terrorist. Becky has found solace in the natural world and poetry. She is also close to an old farmer named Gerald who reminds Becky of her grandparents.

When someone poisons a trout stream at a fishing resort, fingers are pointed at Gerald. The environmentalist Becky feels in her heart that Gerald would never harm the fish. Les investigates the crime in the last few weeks before he retires as sheriff. The sheriff's office is also involved in hunting down another kind of poison--meth--and seeing the damage it has done to some of the town's younger citizens.

The mystery takes a back seat to the stories about Les, Becky, and Gerald--all complicated, flawed characters with good hearts. Les narrates his chapters with normal prose. Other chapters are narrated by Becky in very poetic prose filled with observations about nature. The wonder of the natural world is also expressed through Becky's poetry, and phrases from the poet G.M. Hopkins. Ron Rash's lyrical writing is beautiful as he weaves together a story about an Appalachian small town and the challenges faced by the people who populate it. It also reminds us to stop and open our eyes to the natural beauty in our world.

[Algernon (Darth Anyan) · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have to thank my Goodreads friends for suggesting to me Ron Rash. I'm not sure I would have taken the plunge on my own, as I am a bit wary of thrillers that open with transcendental meditations over a mountain sunset scene and use words like 'abeyant' in relation with ancient cave paintings at Lascaux. In the end, I am glad I went in without misconceptions or misplaced expectations, because I discovered a talented wordsmith, capable of uniting a lyricism and an empathy worthy of James Sallis with the clarity and sharpness of Daniel Woodrell in revealing the trauma and hardship of living in a close, impoverished community. I mentioned Sallis because Rash is also a poet, revealed here through the intimate journal of one of his POV characters - Becky, a park ranger. And I mentioned Woodrell because Above the Waterfall is set in the same disturbing yet fascinating Ozark Mountains, presented in detail by the other POV character - Len, the local Sheriff. I guess if I were the kind of reader who needs to find the correct genre for every novel he reads, this one would belong on the 'country-noir' shelf.

Looking at the main plot, the noir influences are dominant : a world-weary, deeply emotionally scarred Sheriff is retiring and wants to leave a clean plate for his successor, but a series of incidents crop up in his last week on the job, including trespassing, property damage and drug raids on improvised meth labs. Len likes to do things his own way, turning a blind eye on minor infractions as long as bigger troubles happen someplace else. Now he is caught between loyalty to an old school friend and friendship with a cranky old man, while trying to decide if there is any future in a personal liaison with a woman who hides scars as deep as his own.

Man who encouraged clinically depressed wife to kill herself seeks woman, traumatized by school shooting, who later lived with ecoterrorist bomber.

Going back to my comparison to Sallis and Woodrell, I am prompted to remark on another point in common in their oeuvre : social commitment, the ability to look at crime in the context of the larger picture, a picture that includes economic inequality, drug culture (" Television glamorized meth, even when they tried not to." ), wars in foreign countries (and how they cause ripples thousands of miles away), environmental destruction and related protest movements, gun rights and the sick American fascination with violence and serial killers. All these hot button issues are mentioned more in relation to the way they influence the personality of the main actors rather than forming an integral part of the plot, but I found this approach more convincing than the preachy style of lesser writers.

In a county this rural, everyone's connected, if not by blood, then in some other way. In the worst times, the county was like a huge web. The spider stirred and many linked strands vibrated.

Having got the plot out the way (which merits a three star rating at best, the mystery and the identity of the perpetrators being rather obvious) I would like to talk now about the true strong points of the novel : the ways people deal with personal trauma and the ways nature manages to soothe and uplift our spirit. Sheriff Les feels guilty for not doing more to help his suicidal wife. Park Ranger Becky turns herself into an autistic wreck in the aftermath of a school shooting. Farmer Gerald lashes out at the world to ease the pain of losing his only son in a foreign war. Yet somehow they are brought together by their love of the open, vibrant spaces of the Appallachian countryside, by a stream filled with rainbow trout, by a field of wildflowers under the moonlight, by an Edward Hopper painting that captures the essence of loneliness ("Freight Car at Truro"). A local unorthodox preacher urges all of us to discover peace and understanding here on earth instead of waiting for hypothetical rewards in the next one:

Ponder a pretty sunset or the dogwoods all ablossom. Every time you see such it's the hem of the robe of glory. Brothers and sisters, how do you expect to see what you don't seek? Some claim heaven has streets of gold and all such things, but I hold a different notion. When we're there, we'll say to the angels, why, a lot of heaven's glory was in the place we came from. And you know what the angels will say? They'll say yes, pilgrim, and how often did you notice? What did you seek?

I will surely go back and read more of Ron Rash novels and, why not, explore some of his collections of poetry. Judging by the tidbits included here in the haiku-like musings of Becky, Rash is equally adept at prose and verse. He proves to me that word and wonder and world could be one :

as the storm moves on
rain trickles off
the leaves
like an afterthought

[Esil · Rating 4 out of 5]

Above the Waterfall was my first book by Ron Rash but it won't be my last. Reading other reviews, I see comments suggesting that readers familiar with Rash's other books liked this one but not as much as his other books. As a neophyte Rash reader what I read was a beautifully crafted story set in Appalachia reflecting the sadness, despair, brutality and bad decisions that come from deprivation and poverty, and the hope and will to live that come with human connection. This sparse short novel is told through the alternating points of view of Les -- a world weary sheriff on the verge of retirement -- and Becky -- a conservation officer with a love of nature that she expresses through lyrical language. Both Les and Becky come with weighty pasts that make them less than perfect, but arm them with lots of compassion and their own strong moral compasses. The story itself is simple. It's about tension between an old farmer Gerald and a neighbouring new fishing resort, and whether Gerald did or did not do something to sabotage the resort. But it's not the story that makes this book worth reading; it's the people, the world they inhabit and the way Rash weaves it together simply and beautifully conveying so much. If it's not Rash's best book, I'll definitely be looking for some of his other books. Thank you to the publisher and Edelweiss for an opportunity to read and advance copy.

[Camie · Rating 3 out of 5]

I debated about a rating for this book which is the rather simple story of a small town sheriff and a female park ranger who are struggling to put their past behind them. He's contemplating his looming retirement and she is a character mostly portrayed through written prose about the beautiful Appalachian countryside that she dearly loves. Short story short (you can read this book in a few hours) they both end up becoming entangled in a dispute between a longtime local man and an ambitious resort owner and have to work together to find a resolution. I've read several other books by Ron Rash an author who has been described as a gorgeous brutal writer. The lyrical quality of his writing is here but somehow there just doesn't seem to be enough at stake in this story. Overall I'd say it's much like getting vanilla when you ordered chocolate , it's still good but not what you had expected. 3 stars

[Taury · Rating 3 out of 5]

Above the Waterfall by Ron Rash is a character driven crime investigation novel. Taken place in the Appalachian Mountains in current time. Drugs are infiltrating this small town. Along with the drug epidemic is also environmental concerns. The Sheriff, Les and Park Ranger, Becky are investigating. The novel started out strong then fizzled into a dry and monotonous read. I’ve read great reviews about Ron Rash’s novels. Unfortunately for me, we just did not click.

[Annet · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautiful gem of a book!

[Julie · Rating 4 out of 5]

"One thing I think proved, I shall never write to "please," to convert; now am entirely and for ever my own mistress." Virginia Woolf, 'A Writer's Diary'.

Above the Waterfall is Ron Rash's thirteenth work of prose and fifth work of poetry. Hmm, yes, you read that correctly. It is a novel written in part as a prose-poem, alternating between the straightforward storytelling voice of Les, a small-town sheriff three weeks out from retirement, and the slipstream soliloquies of Becky, a park ranger traumatized by a childhood tragedy and a disastrous love affair with an eco-terrorist.

We are in familiar Rash territory: the kudzu- and hemlock-choked borderlands of North Carolina and Tennessee, where the Appalachian struggle between poverty and progress plays out like a Shakespeare tragedy. The terrible beauty of the natural world is present in every scene, haunting and seductive.

Gerald Blackwelder (oh, that name!), an embittered old-timer, is accused of poisoning the habitat of speckled trout on land that belongs to a wealthy resort tycoon. His most vocal champion is Becky Shytle, the park ranger with a poetic, wounded heart. She is also the sheriff's sometime girlfriend. The ambiguity of their relationship is due not only to Becky's emotional fragility, but to Les' fear of ruining another relationship. His marriage ended after his wife attempted suicide; Les's neglect and indifference was nearly her death knell.

The grimy, rotten-mouthed world of meth addiction and production is woven into the plot—it adds a shiver of doom to Les' final days as sheriff—but it is not the main thread. This is a story of characters who struggle to maintain their footing in a place that holds them so close, it nearly crushes the air from their lungs. It is a profoundly-felt work, rich with imagery as all Rash's work, but somehow more personal. Becky's poetry-speak is a window into the author's own fervent, compassionate, lyrical humanism. With Above the Waterfall Rash is now entirely and forever his own master.

[Cheri · Rating 5 out of 5]

"As I pass, the field seems to lift, peek to see what's under itself, then resettle. A pickup passes from the other direction. The flock lifts again and this time keeps rising, a narrowing swirl as if sucked through a pipe and then an unfurl of rhythm sudden sprung, becoming one entity as it wrinkles, smooths out, drifts down like a snapped bedsheet. Then swerves and shifts, gathers and twists. Murmuration: ornithology's word-poem for what I see. Two hundred starlings at most, but in Europe sometimes ten thousand, enough to punctuate a sky. What might a child see? A magic carpet suddenly real? Ocean fish-schools swimming air? The flock turns west and disappears."

"Soon the leaves on the hardwoods would turn. Like the mountains are huddled under a big crazy quilt. That was what my grandmother used to say when it happened. Crazy quilt. It was an expression you rarely heard these days, same as 'Proud to know you,' or 'It's a gracious plenty."

This is my favorite Ron Rash book, and one of my favorite books of the year. I loved the alternating voices, the snippets of poetry and how the alternating viewpoints balanced out the heavier moments in "Above the Waterfall."

[Diane Barnes · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was disappointed in this book. A good story/crime/mystery novel, but the character of Becky and the switch to her point of view every other chapter made the narrative lose steam, in my opinion. Also, her psychological problems resulting from a school shooting in her youth were only alluded to, but never fleshed out.

In all fairness, I suspect that had I read this at another time, I might have liked it better. Unfortunately, I was in line for the download from my library, and when it was sent automatically to my Kindle to be read, I had just finished a very powerful, wonderful, unforgettable novel that nothing else can compare favorably to. But the clock was ticking at the library, so I had to get it read. So only 3 stars to Mr. Rash this time. But I know from his other novels what a truly good writer he is, so I will consider this one an aberration.

[Lorna · Rating 4 out of 5]

Above the Waterfall by Ron Rash is a haunting and poetic and literary tale set in contemporary Appalachia in North Carolina. We meet a lot of broken people, all healing from their own traumas and losses and personal tragedies, as they all find solace in this lyrical and lovely piece of North Carolina's Appalacia. The book opens with park ranger, Becky, finding peace here as she is one with the natural beauty but still haunted by traumatic memories, as follows:

"I sit on ground cooling, soon dew-damp. Near me a moldboard plow long left. Honeysuckle vines twine green cords, white flowers attached like Christmas lights. I touch a handle slick from wrist shifts and sweaty grips. Memory of my grandfather's hands, calluses round and smooth as worn coins. One morning I'd watched him cross the field, the steel oar rippling soil. In its wake, a caught wave of sillion shine. But this plow has wearied into sleep. How long lying here? Perhaps a decade, since saplings and saw briar rise above broom sedge. Above all else, those bold yellow blossoms in full-petaled bloom. What has brought me here."

But at the center of the story is the retirement of Les, the sheriff, with three weeks to wrap up a lot of loose ends in a community haunted by methamphetamine addiction. As we begin to learn the traumas of his past as well as his relationship with Becky. Les is one of those literary heros who has an unconditional love for those close to him and an endearing trait of being able to see the good in everyone. It is hard not to love Les when he describes his treasured painting, Edward Hopper's Freight Car at Truro that has been hanging on his office wall for many years, and one of the few possessions that he will take with him along with his coffee mug.

Essentially there is a mystery about who poured kerosene into a stream in the Appalachian Mountains of North Carolina killing untold numbers of trout in this pristine mountain stream. And Becky is the heart of this book with her affinity to the land and poetry and beauty. And she is a big fan of the poetry of G.M. Hopkins, present throughout this beautiful book. While this is my first novel by Ron Rash, it will not be my last. He has been compared to the writing of William Faulkner and Carson McCullers.

HOW NEAR AT HAND IT WAS
IF THEY HAD EYES TO SEE IT.
--G.M. Hopkins

[Doug H · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is my favorite novel by this author, but it's only my third and I'm a total freak for character-driven writing over plot-driven writing. Add prosody to that and I'm a goner.

My second favorite Rash novel is The World Made Straight. He lays out an exciting plot in that novel and his lyrical writing style is on full display, but it left me wanting stronger female characters.

Serena is my third favorite. It gave me the stronger female character I was looking for (to say the least) and Rash's writing is beautiful again, but it left me a bit cold in the end. I wanted to see what was going on inside of Serena's head in order to understand her motivations, but I never caught a glimpse. To me, she came off as more of an archetype than a human being.

Here, Rash finally brought me very fully inside the heads of his characters, both male and female. I enjoyed the two completely different yet similarly sensitive and interior-looking first person POV voices and I admired Rash's more experimental style here. (The male narrator's voice is presented with more traditional left-brained and full-sentenced prose and the female narrator's voice is presented with more right-brained and sentence-fragmented poetic writing.)

If I were to keep going on to review all of the strong symbolism with the river and the waterfall and all of the very modern mentions of and musings about cell phones and internet pollution, the Great Recession, the Bush wars, environmental terrorism, climate change, school shootings, crystal meth, family dissolution, land-grabbing and general human greed, I'd almost not leave enough room to mention the final images of happy children and monetary and emotional restitution at the end.

4.5 stars, rounded up.

[Ian · Rating 4 out of 5]

The first novel I’ve read by this author, so I can’t comment on how it compares with others in his oeuvre. I thought this was pretty good though. Published in 2015, it’s a shortish but multi-layered novel with chapters that alternate between two first person perspectives. Les is a local sheriff in a rural part of North Carolina, 51 years old and in his last few weeks before retirement. Becky is a forty-something Park Ranger. Both carry a considerable amount of psychological baggage from the past. The two have a friendship that borders on something deeper.

The chapters told from Becky’s point of view feature a lot of introspection and some very descriptive writing about nature. They also feature poems that Becky is writing. If I’d read that description beforehand it might have put me off reading the novel, but that would have been a mistake.

Whilst this book is essentially a character study, the chapters told from Les’ perspective feature the plot driven element. Les has to deal with an escalating dispute involving two neighbouring landowners. As Sheriff he also struggles to cope with the methamphetamine epidemic. That aspect provides some of the book’s most vivid imagery. In part, the novel is about the moral complexities of being sheriff amongst people you have known all your life.

In the novel Becky’s character goes through a spell of elective mutism in childhood, and the theme of “silence” is one she regularly returns to in adult life. Meanwhile Les recalls how he struggled to communicate with his ex-wife. In writing fiction reviews, I struggle to communicate without giving away spoilers, so I’ll finish by saying this was a solid four-star read for me.

[Dianne · Rating 4 out of 5]

I struggled a little with this one, even though Ron Rash is one of my very favorite authors.

The story is told in alternating chapters by Les, a sheriff in a small Appalachian town who is several weeks away from an early retirement at age 51, and Becky, a park ranger with a deep love of nature. Both carry heavy burdens of guilt from events in their past.

The voices of these characters are very different. Les narrates in a very plainspoken, straightforward manner. Becky's narration is much more introspective and often takes the form of poetry that she writes in a journal.

In the short time span covered by this book, you learn about Les and Becky as Les investigates a case involving an elderly man who is accused of poaching trout on land owned by a resort. The case escalates and turns into a bit of a "whodunnit," which is not really typical Ron Rash territory. Between the curious juxtaposition of the different styles of narration and the mild mystery, it didn't quite mesh well for me. That said, Ron Rash's writing is always superlative. Even though this is probably my least favorite of his books thus far, it's still Ron Rash.

A 3.5 for me, but rounding up to 4 for the writing and his keen understanding of human nature.

[Kathleen · Rating 5 out of 5]

The name Ron Rash was familiar to me, as a Goodreads friend (she knows who she is) has been writing fabulous reviews about his books and "singing his praises". However, Above the Waterfall is my first novel authored by Ron Rash. This most certainly will be the first of many, as I too am smitten with the talented Mr. Rash!
Ron Rash writes beautiful prose and poetry, painting detailed images and giving life to his characters with carefully chosen words.

"The moon an ungripped scythe"

"Though sunlight tinged the mountains, black leather-winged bodies swing low. First fireflies blink languidly. Beyond this meadow, cicadas rev and slow like sewing machines. All else ready for night except night itself. I watch last light lift off level land. Ground shadows seep and thicken. Circling trees form banks. The meadow itself becomes a pond filling, on its surface dozens of black-eyed susans."

The above quote comes from the beginning of Part 1 - Becky is in the park. She writes words, phrases and poetry in a notebook she keeps. She and Les take turns narrating the novel.
Rob Neufeld wrote in the Asheville Citizen-Times Aug. 29, 2015
"Ron Rash's new novel, Above the Waterfall, weds a contemporary thriller with a portrayal of people tapping an ancient way of being.
A fish kill precipitates the story involving fishing rights, a crystal meth epidemic, and two reeling characters: Les, the county sheriff, who's sick of human depravity and preparing to retire; and Becky, a park ranger, who has lived in a dream of words and animals ever since she witnessed her schoolteacher being shot by an intruder."

Although I did not identify with any of the characters, it was easy to appreciate the environment, with Becky (trees, bushes, plants, birds and animals), Gerald (the speckled trout in the stream above the waterfall with water so pristine he could count the dots on the fish) and Les (his landscape paintings, and cabin in the wilderness and disgust with the needles, pill containers and other trash littering clearings and pathways in the woods).
Rob Neufeld's afore mentioned article in the Asheville Citizen-Times quotes Ron Rash:-
"A lot of this book is about the need to protect the natural world, or revere it. But I think people have to first see the world before they can even care about it."
When asked about Les and Becky, Mr. Rash was quoted,"I think they're both trying to find a way to survive. Because of this human but horrific thing that Les had done, telling his wife, "Well, just go ahead and kill yourself"-and she almost did- that since then, he's tried to look for the worst in the world because in a way it lets him off the hook...I see Becky at the same time-and it's words are so destructive for both of them-Becky has to find the good and see the beauty to survive.
...there are these two people who have been severely wounded by language and who are trying in some way to find a way back into the world. They're both exiles in different ways. They're people who have been drawn to loneliness."

Prior to reading Above the Waterfall, I knew nothing about meth and the drug culture. Through Les, Mr. Rash has educated me on the power and hold of crystal meth and the swift decline of humanity it causes.

Although I had the hardcover edition of Above the Waterfall, we listened to the unabridged audio version beautifully performed by Richard Ferrone and Tavia Gilbert.
I am looking forward to reading through my long list of books by Ron Rash, a new favourite author. Just noticed that 18 of my friends have this book on their TBR lists. I highly recommend that you move it up close to the top.
5 *****

[Jessica J. · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really love reading good Appalachian fiction. I have very strong Appalachian roots, and sometimes it’s nice to get away from more metropolitan kind of stories and to be reminded of the very specific cultural quirks that I miss. I feel like Ron Rash should really scratch that itch of mine (no pun intended), and so I jumped at the chance to snag an ARC, but this really came up short for me.

Set in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, Above the Waterfall is about Les, a sheriff on the brink of retirement, and Becky, his park ranger lady friend with a troubled past and a very specific sense of obligation. The two find themselves on opposite sides of each other when Les must investigate an act of environmental terrorism that is not what it seems to be on the surface.

I think the reason this book didn’t have enough oomph for me is that the character development – Becky in particular – felt kind of ham-fisted and incomplete. Becky came to North Carolina to escape a childhood trauma and the memory of a bad relationship with a violent man, but I don’t think her background was woven in to the present-day tale in a successful manner. I often found myself reading about her emotional struggles as a younger woman and thinking, “What does this have to do with the price of potatoes?” I didn’t feel like it informed her actions in the face of the crime – it didn’t tell me why she was doing what she was doing, and I never really felt like I understood her sense of obligation to Gerald. Rash wanted to draw a connection between Gerald and Becky’s former beau, to force us to question her judgment, but that connection felt kind of forced and inauthentic to me. And the stuff with the personal trauma – which Rash keeps a little more shrouded in mystery – did zero to help me understand Becky within the context of the main action of the book.

Though I was reading this on an eight-hour transatlantic flight, so it's possible that I wasn't reading as carefully as I should have been?

If Becky had received less focus, I might have enjoyed this book a lot more. I liked reading Les’s perspective as the kind of sheriff who is willing to take kickbacks from pot dealers to deal with his county’s meth problems but who is also willing to consider the Appalachian sense of pride and obligation when dealing with criminal matters. He is very much in tune with his community and he is a very specific type of flawed that we may have seen before but didn’t feel too clichéd. His investigation was full of twists and turns that were occasionally predictable and yet intriguing.

Ultimately, I felt like this book was a little phoned-in. It was by no means a bad book and I’m sure there are many other readers who will enjoy it quite a bit, but to me, even its deepest depths felt rather shallow and that was kind of disappointing.

[Marianne · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Though sunlight tinges the mountains, black leather-winged bodies swing low. First fireflies blink languidly. Beyond this meadow, cicadas rev and slow like sewing machines. All else is ready for night except night itself. I watch the last light lift off level land. Ground shadows seep and thicken. Circling trees form banks. The meadow itself becomes a pond filling, on its surface dozens of black-eyed susans”

This, the first paragraph of Ron Rash’s sixth novel, assures readers that they are, once again, in for a feast of beautiful prose. While his evocative descriptions of place confirm Rash’s love of the Appalachia, this award-winning American author works the same magic on his characters, and not just the major ones. Be they strong or weak, principled or easily corrupted, it soon becomes apparent that he cares just as much for the people that populate the North Carolina mountains.

His tale covers a five-day period during which Les, a sheriff about to retire, deals not only with meth addicts, but also a fish-kill at a local upmarket Resort. It seems from video evidence and earlier confrontations that Gerald Blackwelder, an elderly widower with a bad heart, is responsible. But Becky Shytle, the Park Ranger with whom Les has a tentative relationship, is convinced that Gerald is innocent. Of course, Les knows that Becky has been wrong about a man before.

This novel is not about the mystery, the who of which is relatively obvious, the how and why, fairly easily solved, but about the characters and their interaction. The first person narrative is shared by Les and Becky: distinguishing between the two is easy when one pays attention to the context; but Rash also uses different styles of narrative, giving Becky a much more lyrical voice, a poetic way with words. Les muses: “You can see heaven all around us, Preacher Waldorp claimed. But Mist Creek Valley would soon confirm that the same was true of hell”, while Becky describes her night under the stars thus: “Above me that night, tiny lights brightened and dimmed, brightened and dimmed. Photinus carolinus. Fireflies synchronized to make a single meadow-wide flash, then all dark between. Like being inside the earth’s pulsing heart”

Rash touches on a myriad of topics: depression, guilt, post-traumatic stress, the divide between legal and moral, loyalty, and the strength of the bond with place. “I’d seen others besides C.J.’s great-uncle leave houses where they and their families had lived for generations. They’d enter nursing homes or move in with sons or daughters. Like I told C.J., you’d be going to their funerals within six months”

Readers new to Rash’s work are sure to want to seek out his backlist; fans will not be disappointed with this latest work. A brilliant read.

[Magdalena aka A Bookaholic Swede · Rating 3 out of 5]

Les is a long-time sheriff in a small Appalachia town and he has a close albeit a bit problematical relationship with Becky a park ranger since both are damage people with sad memories and that makes them a bit restrained and not eager to jump into a new relationship. Les only has 3 more weeks to work when a Gerard an elderly man is accused of poison the trout stream out of revenge because the resort that owns the land doesn't want him trespassing on the land because he is scaring the guests. Becky is convinced that Gerard is innocent and Les isn't so sure either that Gerald is the one behind the deed. And, there are some people that would benefit from Gerald convicted and off his land...

I'm a big fan of Craig Johnson's Longmire series and when I saw this book about a sheriff in an Appalachia town, well I jump at the chance to read it. In several ways, it did remind me of the Longmire books. We have an old sheriff in small town and also the day shift dispatcher is called Ruby and we even have a character called Martha in the book. So now and then I got some Longmire vibes. What the book lacked was a Vic character. But I liked Becky, she is a park ranger with a sad past, she survived a school shooting as a kid and the memories of that are something she is carrying with her all the time. Les and Becky have a close bond and it shows in the book.

The story in the book, the case with Gerald is my biggest problem because I felt right away that he is probably innocent and if it is so then somebody else must be the culprit and there weren't many suspects to choose from. So even though I enjoyed the book I also felt that it would have been so much more interesting to read if the story had been more elaborated. A twist or two to the story would have been great. Now it was just an acceptable reading, not an engrossing one. And, that is too bad because I really liked both Les and Becky.

I received this copy from Ecco through Edelweiss in return for an honest review! Thank you!

[Sara the Librarian · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a quiet book. You know what I mean. It was one of those reads that you fall sort of softly into without realizing, almost like falling asleep. You let the rhythm of the authors words wash over you and just kind of let the story happen.

Les is the long time sheriff of a small Appalachian town on the edge of retirement. His days are spent dealing with the ever growing plague of meth in his town and the petty squabbles of the local residents who fight progress with every weapon they can find. He's done what was necessary to keep the peace even if it hasn't always been strictly legal. His personal past is checkered with regret and he looks toward a quiet, contemplative retirement in the beautiful cabin he's having built deep in the woods.

He keeps company with Becky, a forest ranger, who's own tragic past puts his to shame. They walk on the edges of a deep relationship, both reluctant to put the possibility of happiness in the power of another person.

When an older local resident who Becky has grown close to is accused of poisoning the water at a local resort, killing the well stocked streams used by its patrons, the stage is set for one last, tragic case for Les to solve before he can hang up his badge for good.

I didn't expect to enjoy this as much as I did. I'm not usually one for meditative, good ol' boy stories populated with salt of the earth types who say "A'yuh" every other word. But Rash surprised me with the startling, sharp beauty of his prose. He writes about hard things, dark realities that we'd prefer not to see. His characters are hard people, often without education or the ability to express emotions in a way that "normal" people can empathize with. But they're still good people who can see beauty and feel love and be hurt. Rash trusts those basic human qualities to be enough for us to connect with his characters and he's right. The horrors he write about don't exactly become palatable, talking about people addicted to meth is never going to be lovely, but he makes it something tragic rather then frightening.

It was easy, effortless, to like Les and Becky. They've been dealt rough hands by life and I found myself understanding why they did the things they did as their histories are slowly revealed throughout the story. You see why they would reach out for each other but be unable to take those last few steps into a real relationship.

Rash lets both characters narrate the book. A chapter devoted to Les's no nonsense observations and well calculated approach to solving the mystery is followed by Becky's days spent in the forest educating groups of school children and writing desperate sounding poetry about what she sees and remembers from her past. Becky's poems do on occasion verge on the melodramatic and her character is stronger and more believable when its simply her talking and remembering but that's a small criticism in an otherwise lovely book.

Rash leaves things on a somewhat ambiguous note, though the mystery is resolved, for his two protagonists leaving me wondering if its really possible for two such wounded souls to ever really find peace. He seems to be reminding his readers that we can imagine the serenity of a quiet life in the mountains, see it in our minds as an escape from our materialistic, techno saturated realities but it will only ever be a fantasy. There will always be darkness under the lovely grey mist on the meadow. Its how we choose to meet that darkness that matters.

[Laura · Rating 4 out of 5]

There's no poison, dead bodies barb-wired in trees, escaped prisoners but that doesn't mean Rash doesn't draw you in. Not my favorite Rash novel but very much enjoyed. I liked the two different point of views. I would have liked more details about the school shooting but dang, that was eerie! This is the second book I have read in the last two months that bring the subject matter of eco-terrorist to light, interesting. Not a huge poetry fan, but it worked.