The Hunt Out of the Thicket

by John Morel Adler

Overview

This stunning book of short stories introduces the literary world to an author who writes of the outdoors with rare artistry and exactitude. John Morel Adler knows the woods, thickets, swamps, rivers, and coasts of his native Georgia and South Carolina Lowcountry. He knows its wildlife and its people. These tales of outdoor life are equally and simultaneously stories of what another writer about the Southern wilderness, William Faulkner, called "the truths of the human heart in conflict with itself," and they search keenly into the meanings of life and death, youth and love, time and change.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781616202927
Publisher:	Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill
Publication date:	11/01/2013
Sold by:	Hachette Digital, Inc.
Format:	eBook
Pages:	206
File size:	3 MB

About the Author

No Bio

Editorial Reviews

The quality of the 10 stories in this first collection will be best appreciated by readers who like hunting and fishing. Others may be put off by Adler's depiction of hunting as an almost mystical experience and his romanticization of violence. In precise word-paintings Adler evokes the deep woods, tidal flats, seacoast and people of both his native Georgia and South Carolina's low country. The hunt here often serves as pretext for delving into human relationships, as in ``Two Moons,'' a tale of a lover's heartbreak, or ``The Twin Oaks,'' about a small, independent farm's wrenching takeover by an agribusiness corporation. Several fine stories sensitively explore racial conflict or harmony. In ``Night Casting,'' the camaraderie of shrimping unites two white boys and an old black fisherman. A real estate agent's racist attitude gives another strong story, ``Unimproved Property,'' its ironic title. (Sept.)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

Adler obviously writes about what he knows and loves: hunting, fishing, and farming in the low country of Georgia and South Carolina. With little emphasis on plot or character development, these stories are uncluttered, sensitive, thoughtful reflections that thematically focus on relationships between young and old, male and female, black and white. Realistic dialog and artful description are highlights, and the affection Adler has for this area and its inhabitants is apparent on every page. Recommended.-- Dorothy Golden, Georgia Southern Univ . , Statesboro

Library Journal