Loving the Dead and Gone

by Judith Turner-Yamamoto, Sophie Amoss (Read by), various narrators (Read by), Roger Clark (Read by), Cassandra Campbell (Read by)

Overview

In this “bittersweet fantastical “must-read debut (Publishers Weekly) a freak car crash in 1960s rural North Carolina puts in motion moments of grace that bring redemption to two generations of women and the lives they touch. “There’s more than one aching heart in this excellent story exploring the generational effects of love, loss, betrayal, and redemption.” — Southern Literary Review, September Read of the Month For forty years Aurilla Cutter has tended a clutch of secrets that have turned her mean. A fatal accident becomes the catalyst for the release of the passions, needs, and hurts in everyone affected by her hidden past. Darlene, a seventeen-year-old widow, struggles to reconnect with her dead husband while proving herself alive. Soon loss and death work their magic, drawing Darlene into an unlikely affair that threatens to upend Aurilla’s family, and sets loose Aurilla’s own memories of longing and infidelity. Loving the Dead and Gone is a lyrical novel that explores how both grief and love are the ties that bind.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9798212275316
Publisher:	Blackstone Publishing
Publication date:	09/06/2022
Product dimensions:	5.20(w) x 5.70(h) x (d)

About the Author

Judith Turner-Yamamoto's work has appeared in StorySOUTH, Mississippi Review, American Literary Review, and in many anthologies, including Walking the Edge, Show Us Your Papers, and Gravity Dancers. Her fellowships and awards include the Virginia Arts Commission, the Ohio Arts Council, the VCCA, the Thomas Wolfe Fiction Prize, and the Virginia Screenwriting Award. An art historian, her articles are published in Travel + Leisure, Elle, Art & Antiques, Interiors, and The Boston Globe.

Editorial Reviews

07/04/2022

Turner-Yamamoto’s bittersweet fantastical debut involves the parallel stories of two grieving women. In 1963 Donald Ray Spencer, 19, dies in a car accident in Clear Creek, N.C. The author then flashes back to 1925 Clear Creek when Aurilla Cutter, at 22, meets tobacco farmer Joe Cutter. Aurilla’s marriage to Joe is just one of many choices she regrets, including not running away with Joe’s youngest brother, Hank, as well as her seeming inability to love her daughter, Berta Mae. Berta Mae marries Clayton Bishop, first to arrive at the site of Donald Ray’s crash during a fishing trip. Clayton begins an affair with Donald Ray’s young widow Darlene, 17, who believes Donald Ray’s spirit is still alive. Though it can be hard to follow the large cast of interrelated characters, their connections eventually come to light with surprising revelations. Turner-Yamamoto does a good job developing parallels between Darlene’s and Aurilla’s lives, as both women refuse to let go of their dead lovers and continue to be haunted by their ghosts. As Aurilla says near the end, “Loving the dead and gone was the sweetest love of all.” Reading this story is almost as delectable. (Sept.)

Publishers Weekly

"Loving the Dead and Gone is an absorbing account of two generations of women, living in North Carolina, who struggle to put love at the centre of their lives.  How well Turner-Yamamoto understands the complexities of passion, the necessity of work, and the limits of small towns.  This beautifully written novel, with its complicated, stubborn characters, will haunt you long after the last page.” —Margot Livesey, author of The Boy in The Field

“There has been an accident in tiny Gold Ridge, a place where most lives revolve around farming the earth or working the hosiery mill, and everyone is changed by it. In a voice that rings with the colloquial timbre of William Faulkner melded with the rural realism of Carol Chute’s The Beans of Egypt, Maine, Judith Turner-Yamamoto brilliantly uses a tragedy to draw us into a place so real you can smell it, where her tapestry of narrator voices captivates us with empathy and love. I was fortunate to be on the panel of the Ohio Artistic Awards in Literature that chose to award Loving the Dead and Gone, recognizing its lyric strength and deep and empathic understanding of rural America." —Elizabeth Cohen, author of The Hypothetical Girl

"Turner-Yamamoto's multigenerational saga reminds me of Bobbie Gentry’s great Patchwork album, with a touch of William Goyen, Lee Smith, and Our Town. This bittersweet paean to a NC Piedmont hosiery mill town is a mid- 20th century time capsule of car wrecks, nerve medicine, open caskets, ghosts, and gossip. Bad luck and trouble ricochet between families until desire and memories are swept away. And yet, the female lens and circular narrative make Loving the Dead and Gone a sensory delight." —Richard Peabody, editor, Gargoyle Magazine

“Judith Turner-Yamamoto's Loving the Dead and Gone is a love story that begins with a tragedy, proceeds through loss and suffering, and winds up in a place of deeply earned redemption. Though there are several characters who guide us through this unstoppable narrative, none is more breathtakingly rendered that Aurilla Cutter. Women like Aurilla, we say in the South, will live forever because they're too mean to die. Ah, but Aurilla has a past that will touch your heart and explain her present. She's an unforgettable character among a cast of unforgettables, from her put-upon daughter Berta May, to the heartbroken and fiery seventeen-year-old widow, Darlene, to Berta May's haunted husband, Clayton. Actually, everything about Loving the Dead and Gone, to Judith Turner-Yamamoto's great credit, is unforgettable." —Ed Falco, author of the New York Times Best Seller, The Family Corleone

“Judith Turner-Yamamoto has written a brilliantly lyrical novel born of her native Southern heritage. Within these pages are the compelling and unforgettable characters of a North Carolina family steeped in love and generational conflict tempered by a tough country spirit.”—Kay Sloan, author of The Patron Saint of Red Chevys, a Barnes and Noble Discover Great New Writers selection

"Turner-Yamamoto’s bittersweet fantastical debut involves the parallel stories of two grieving women… As Aurilla says near the end, “Loving the dead and gone was the sweetest love of all.” Reading this story is almost as delectable." —Publishers Weekly

“A bittersweet fantastical debut.” —Publishers Weekly

“Loving the Dead and Gone is a moving, insightful novel about growing through tragedy.” —Foreword Reviews

 “Turner-Yamamoto’s deft characterization and the authentic rural American setting makes Loving the Dead and Gone something special. The tale of tragedy, love, and loss is truly one for the ages.” —Authorlink

“Loving the Dead and Gone is a story of redemption and how we make the most of our lives when so much is out of our control.” —Southern Review of Books

“In addition to the main themes of loss, grief, and bereavement, this beautifully scripted, expressive novel eloquently explores the complicated love-hate relationships between mothers and daughters, and of loveless, cold marriages held together only by responsibility and commitment.’ —Fictionophile

 “Judith Turner-Yamamoto’s accomplished novel, Loving the Dead and Gone, is a beautifully rendered story of love and longing.” —Bloom

From the Publisher