Demon Copperhead

I've been meaning to write a quick review about Demon Copperhead, because I LOVE THIS BOOK, but it's taken me awhile to get around to it. First of all I was knocked flat by the voice, had the wind clean knocked out of me, so I had to build in some recovery time there, just basically recovering from the sheer awesomeness of this book. And then, yeah, I've been busy getting my soul sucked out by the CDA, the Corporate Dementors of America. 

A more current reference from Severence: I don't know what my Innie has been up to but it's really taking it outa me. 

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So these are the things I really liked about Demon Copperhead. 

1) It's funny. The narrator is priceless. From the first page. "First, I got myself born. A decent crowd was on hand to watch, and they've always given me that much: the worst of the job was up to me, my mother being let's just say out of it." 

And it continues with a wondrous description of the birth scene: 

"On any other day they'd have seen her outside on the deck of her trailer home, good neighbors taking notice, pestering the tit of trouble as they will. All through the dog breath- air of late summer and fall, cast an eye up the mountain and there she'd be, little bleach-blonde smoking her Pall Malls, hanging on that railing like she's captain of her ship up there and now might be the hour it's going down. This is an eighteen-year-old gril we're discussing, all on her own and as pregnant as it gets. The day she failed to sow, it fell to Nance Peggot to go bang on the door, barge inside, and finer her passed out on the bathroom floor with her junk all over the place and me already coming out. A slick fish-colored hostage picking up grit from the vinyl tile, worming and shoving around because I'm still inside the sack that babies float in pre-real-life." 

Okay, so there's a lot going on here. Beginning with the voice of Demon. Observational, poetic, self-aware and miraculously sustained for 548 pages. The voice of Demon educates us to the dialect and local color, but it's never obscure or so hard to read that you need to go back and read it again. And it's deceptively literate, as in being actual literature. Note all of the references to water and the sea in just this one first paragraph. Mom is the captain of a sinking ship... the fetus is barging it's way out. This is foreshadowing folks–Demon has a yen for the ocean, and spends the entire book trying to get there, to get back to that sack of salt water, just floating and comfortable. 

The second thing that I really like about the book is the description of the Appalachian culture - including and especially Melungeons–which I had no idea about, and how the Appalachian regional underclass has been Demon-ized and hillbilly-ized and exploited and held down. I learned so much from this book. I really did. I can't stop thinking about it. Demon Copperhead did what books should do: Provided insight through the use of story, giving you a more in-depth understanding than any set of statistics or news story ever could. I'm incrementally better and more compassionate person because I read this book and met these characters.  

Thirdly, I really fell in love with the good characters, and as for the bad characters, they were all real enough to hate. 

Fourthly, the description of the opiate epidemic was spot on, both at a macro and micro level. BK showed us the impact on the culture, but also what it's like to be strung out. The characterization of addiction and recovery was 98.6% correct, and that is not always true in books and the media. I've got a little experience in this area, and she nailed it. It's a good companion piece to Dopesick. 

Fiftly, the story really kept moving. It's a good story, with a beginning, middle and end. All that stuff we learn in writer school. It's all there, without calling too much attention to itself. This is an author at the "top of her craft" if anyone's quoting me. 

Lastly, Barbara Kingsolver transparently executes a point-by-point retelling of David Copperfield; a modern prism through which to view our current culturally  enforced poverty and systemic dis-entitlement. This isn't just a cute literary trick, it's illuminating and powerful social criticism. "Hey the same dehumanizing forces of unbridled heartless capitalism  unleashed by the British Empire during the industrial revolution England are alive and well and creating misery right here in Coal Country." (And it our cities, etc.) 

I have a good friend that just bought a farm half way between Knoxville and Nashville. His favorite book is A Tale of Two Cities, by Charles Dickens. I think I'll go visit him. I hope he reads this book. And we can talk about it while drinking ice tea and watching as the fireflies come out as dusk falls. Did I also really loved Demon's awareness of nature and sense of displacement when he goes to the city? I felt like that when I left the Pacific Northwest. Like a walk in the woods, the digressions are really the point. What were we talking about? 

Oh yeah, this is one great book. 

***** 

addendumb. 

I finally got one comment on something I wrote on this under-publicized public leaving of mine. A visitor to Camp Pen Cramp!  The visitor scrawled something on the outhouse wall, something to the effect of: "very cool, a bit random, a lot of typos, are you okay?"

That's a lot to respond to, ya really packed a lot into one sentence. But I'll try. 

1) "Very cool." - thanks! 
2) "A bit random" - that's absolutely the point of the joke, thanks for catching on. I feel heard. 
3) "A lot of typos" -  yeah, it's all sort of in process. Apologies. 
4) "Are you okay?" - thanks for your concern. Much better than I probably sound, and definitely better than I deserve to be, on the average. Hope you're ok, too. 

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Anyway, so ecstatic that I may have had one reader, this one time, for these very personal writings. Invite your friends ... IF you have any friends that read. I know readers are in short supply, but come one, come all to Camp Pencramp. (Pronounced, Comh-PenCRAH.) Leave more cryptic anonymous notes. Roast some marshmallows. Sings some songs. Tell some jokes. Have a good time. 

*****

I know it's tough to believe, but I write for a living. It's my job. So the last thing I want to do during my free time is sit at a computer and type. 

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