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| Forthcoming in April; available now for pre-order at Amazon and Barnes & Noble. |
From The Oklahoman:
Woodring proves the best subjects for writers are death and love. She melds them deftly, almost magically, with word pictures that are simply astounding and must be read again and again.--Mary McReynolds
From Booklist:
Woodring proves the best subjects for writers are death and love. She melds them deftly, almost magically, with word pictures that are simply astounding and must be read again and again.--Mary McReynolds
From Booklist:
When a Goliath-like man from a small town dies
under unexpected, mysterious circumstances, his life, death, and legacy leave
the town alternating between grief and despair, hope and innovation.
Leading-citizen Percy Harding stuns the southern townsfolk of Goliath when his
body is discovered by the train tracks as an apparent suicide. A collection of
fully drawn characters spin through their emotions in different ways, inviting
speculation about the town’s history and the complicated relationships among
its citizens. Percy’s longtime secretary, Rosamond Rogers, takes his death
harder than most, having been closer to him than just about anyone in town. Her
determination to ferret out the truth about everything while simultaneously
hiding from it propels the gently meandering plot, as past and present collide
with sometimes unpleasant yet always revealing results. Ultimately a novel
about a town that takes on a life of its own, Woodring’s latest is melodious,
deliberate, surprising, and full of those essential little moments that make up
entire lifetimes. Readers who enjoy sinking into the layered details of
small-town life should enjoy this rich portrait.— Julie Trevelyan
D.G. Martin, host of UNC-TV's North Carolina Bookwatch
Read this book for the
factory-closing experience, for its unforgettable characters, or just to get to
know the writing of Susan Woodring, who, with this book, joins the ranks of
North Carolina’s best writers.
Like a contemporary Winesburg, Ohio, Susan Woodring’s GOLIATH brings small town life beautifully, achingly alive. Sprinkled with marching bands, baseball, and parades, and a cast of southern characters who will charm the pants off you, GOLIATH is a memorable novel, written in a memorable new voice.
Ann Hood, author of THE KNITTING CIRCLE
GOLIATH is a beautiful and quietly moving story of love, grief, forgiveness and redemption — heady themes handled here with a big heart and a deft hand. In prose exquisitely clear and with details that will make your heart ache, Susan Woodring has written a meaningful portrait of small town life, and what it means to move through grief toward love.
Bret Lott, author of JEWEL and ANCIENT HIGHWAY
Woodring's writing is so clear and moving that the reader often feels, as she says of about one of her characters, as if 'the world had been sucked clear of true sound.' This beautiful portrait of a place and its people, rendered so quietly and intimately, shuts out the world outside its pages as you read. Only the best novels can make you forget yourself as reader. GOLIATH is the kind of book you don't want to put down or to end.
Brad Watson, author of THE HEAVEN OF MERCURY
GOLIATH is a careful, contemplative study of the rhythms of collective grief. Woodring's sense of the constraints and hard-earned pleasures of home rings as true and pure as a train whistle in the night.
Michael Parker, author of A WATERY PART OF THE WORLD
