1.[Andy Catlett: Early Travels]is more like a memoir than a novel, as it is told from the point of view of the older man reflecting on his 9-year-old self--the boy whose story this is. It is also eerily timely, as it contemplates the problem of racism, particularly the non-violent, "kindly" yet condescending paternalistic kind that presented itself in the treatment of the black people he encountered in his community and on his grandparents' farms in his childhood during the 1940's.
Read and reviewed in 2020.

2. Nathan Coulter: A wonderful "slice of life" story told from the perspective of a young boy starting to observe the way things happen, watching his older brother grow away from him, hunting with his Uncle Burley, coping with the death of his mother, and beginning to think about things he's been used to taking for granted. The language is wonderful, the characters are rich and real, and wryly funny; the setting is...well, the setting is home to me. Port William, KY, and its surroundings are very like the small town and countryside where I grew up, if you substitute our corn for their tobacco, and move forward into the 20th century just a few decades. Nothing will do for me now but that I become as familiar with this world and its inhabitants as I am with Yoknapatawpha County. Luckily, Berry won't make me work quite as hard at it as Ol' Uncle Billy did. That was the main course---this is dessert.

3. These two short novels, with all the short stories that fit chronologically between them, comprised a good deal of my August 2020 reading time, and it was wonderful to be in and about Port William. These stories have a great appeal to me...they tick all the boxes, as they say. Simple good people, a few rascals and ne'er-do-wells, some drunkards, but very little real wickedness. There's plenty of sorrow, hardship, loss and grief, but it feels as "right", in context, as the freedom of childhood and the routine of daily life, until World War II and the murder of Andy's favorite uncle knock it all off kilter. Berry's ability to re-create the world of rural farm life (in Kentucky, but that only means tobacco is the main crop--it could so easily be the little pocket of the Delaware River Valley in Pennsylvania where I grew up) in the early 20th century is nothing short of genius. A perfect antidote to living in the early 21st. Highly recommended for your soul. ( )