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A river called Long Man has coursed through East Tennessee from time immemorial, bringing sustenance to the people who farm along its banks and who trade between its small towns. But as Long Man opens, the Tennessee Valley Authority's plans to dam the river and flood the town of Yuneetah for the sake of progress - to bring electricity and jobs to the hardscrabble region - are about to take effect.
Just one day remains before the river will rise, and most of the town has been evacuated. Among the holdouts is a young mother, Annie Clyde Dodson, whose ancestors have lived for generations on her mountaintop farm; she'll do anything to ensure that her three-year-old daughter, Gracie, will inherit the family's land. But her husband wants to make a fresh start in Michigan, where he has found work that will secure the family's future. As the deadline looms, a storm as powerful as the emotions between them rages outside their door. Suddenly, they realize that Gracie has gone missing. Has she simply wandered off into the rain? Or has she been taken by Amos, the mysterious drifter who has come back to town, perhaps to save it in a last, desperate act of violence?
Suspenseful, visceral, gorgeously told, Long Man is a searing portrait of a tight-knit community brought together by change and crisis, and of one family facing a terrifying ticking clock. It is a dazzling and unforgettable tour de force.
"Starred Review. Unforgettable... Greene's enormous talent animates the voices and landscape of East Tennessee so vividly, and creates such exquisite tension, that the reader is left devastated." - Publishers Weekly
"Starred Review. Harrowing, riveting... A smart and moody historical novel that evokes the best widescreen Southern literature." - Kirkus
"Equal parts mystery, family saga and backwoods romance, Long Man captures the collision of hardscrabble folk with the unstoppable modern world." - Stewart O'Nan, author of A Prayer for the Dying and Emily, Alone
"A gem. Long Man is so palpably real that I feel I've spent the last few days actually living in Greene's corner of Depression-era Tennessee." - Steve Yarbrough, author of Prisoners of War and The Realm of Last Chances
This information about Long Man was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Amy Greene was born and raised in the foothills of the Smoky Mountains, where she lives with her husband and two children. Her second novel Long Man will be published by Alfred A. Knopf February 25, 2014. Her first novel Bloodroot is available in bookstores and online.
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