It would have been less painful to just slit my wrists and get it over with. Rarely have I read a more bleak book.

After almost reading halfway through the book I just couldn't do it any more. This is just not the book for me. Very depressing and too much inappropriate stuff. I would rather use my time to read some more worthy...krb 4/21/17

Flat, one dimensional characters set in a dreary depressing novel. This is the furthest thing from southern literature imaginable. Stereotypical hillbilly language and a husband who beats his wife. No one respects the young wife who appears to be the only character who can make a living, bury the dead, and fight a house fire. I hated this book and will never read anything by this author again. I'm pretty sure he despises women too. Colossal waste of time.

I don't have a clear set of reasons why I didn't love this book. It seemed needlessly brutal at times, and the relationship between the two main characters didn't work for me. I know that they were going for some kind of "realism" but any book with a dead kid is a hard thing to read. Two dead kids? It's not something I'm going to recommend to my friends. Also, what was with the childbirth scene? I've given birth half a dozen times and it's very apparent the writer does not own a uterus. Note to author: childbirth pain does not run down your spine in multicolored lightning bursts. Even a baby born "sunny side up" is more unbearable spinal pressure than fireworks. Can no more describe it to a man than a man can describe getting racked up to a woman. Sigh.

Although this book was unrelentingly sad, the characters were wonderful. I loved the way Julie and her husband, Hank, developed through the story. Julie was so wise for her age and knew just how to handle conflict with her husband. Hank changed from an impulsive, willful man to a kind and gentle father and husband. When I read about what it took to do laundry at the turn of the century, I certainly appreciated my washer and dryer. The account of slaughtering the hog also made me appreciate being able to open my refrigerator and take out some bacon slices. Living was so hard back then, especially in Appalachia.

Interesting look into the life of 1900's South Carolina hills. Apparently the author based the book loosely on his grandparent's first year of marriage.

But...such a hard, dark year it was! I was sad even when I wasn't reading the book.

It's amusing that this novel is recommended by the Oprah Book Club juggernaut alongside Faulkner, because Morgan is trying for the Faulkner unreliable narrator, first-person regional dialect. I don't think he's entirely successful, though.

The dust jacket let us know he's from North Carolina mountain stock, and the setting feels pretty authentic. I think it's late 1800s or around the turn of the century, but it's not entirely clear. I do wish that had been more obvious, but then the narrator, Julie Richards, is clearly uneducated and fairly unobservant. She’s more of a reporter of events, which are mostly tragedies. I couldn’t help but compare it to My Antonia, which is a similar tale of hardship (this time on the prairie) but with significantly more literary aplomb. It’s clear that Morgan did extensive research, and he certainly seems to have his facts and details right, but all that comes at the expense of the narrative; it feels self-conscious and I found myself easily distracted. The words he puts in Julie’s mouth overcompensate for his being a man writing in a female voice, and she is forced to give clunky exposition.

I could never wrap my mind around the characterization of either Julie or her husband Hank; the tertiary characters, on the other hand, are given distinct personalities, though we are told more than we see. Hank in particular is an enigma, and I don’t think it does the story any favors to have him be so mysterious and hostile. The conclusion wasn’t particularly satisfying, though I was relieved that the sadness was over, at least.

The subtitle of this book is "The Story of a Marriage." Well, it is that, in the same sense that "Moby-Dick" is the story of a whale. It is the story of growing up, of living a hardscrabble rural life, of learning the ways of the world, of discovering one's own strength, and of coming to terms with grief. Morgan creates a vivid main character, Julie, who is wholly believable and whom I rooted for all the way. I recommend this book.

Found this at a Little Free Library, and what a find! Its genre is kind of a “backwoods survival by a plucky woman and her almost-equally-plucky husband around the turn of the 20th Century.” Similar works might include “Cold Mountain” (book and movie, the latter with a well-deserved Oscar for Renee Zellweger), “Winter’s Bone” (book and movie the latter of which has well-deserved accolades but, to my mind, unacceptable Oscar snubs for Jennifer Lawrence and John Hawkes), and “Heartland” (1979 movie set in my home state of Montana in 1910, starring Rip Torn and Conchata Farrell, in her finest hour, an Oscar-worthy performance to my mind), all of which depict courage, strength and determination in the face of the most terrible of conditions.

Julie Harmon, the narrator, is the middle (but most responsible) daughter in a family living in Flat Rock, a small community in the mountains of North Carolina. The book starts out with the illness and death of Julie’s brother Mesenier, after a grueling trip up the mountain to fetch a doctor. Gives you an immediate flavor of the kind of environment the family must endure on a daily basis. At age nineteen, Juliee meets Hank Richards, falls in love, and hastily marries him, and they move across the state line to Gap Creek, in the mountains of South Carolina. And all this is just the preamble to what follows.

Julie and Hank have been raised in harsh conditions, so they tend to weather whatever the world throws at them. But DANG, it’s an avalanche of severe challenges. For one, they come across an abandoned house, which they fix up, and meet the owner, Mr. Pendergast, with whom they share the space. He situation tuns tragic when he dies and the house partially burns down. But any way you look at it, the couple’s existence is subsistence, mostly with crops, canning and knowledge of cooking with very little. There is a vivid description of the killing and butchering of a hog, reminiscent of similar scene in the above-mentioned “Heartland.” Their tenancy at the house remains precarious throughout, and there are several instances of nefarious individuals who take advantage of them. The weather is extreme and their marriage is challenged again and again by the stresses of existence. Throughout all of this, it is obvious that Julie is the stronger of the two, and she not only puts up with his wanting to give up, but actually boosts him and makes him stronger and a better partner. A local preacher befriends them, and eventually the couple finds comfort, solace and strength in the church community. Julie has an ambivalent-at-bestr relationship with Hank’s mother, “Ma Richards,” but comes to respect and befriend her. To complicate things, Julie becomes pregnant and suffers thorough unspeakable hardships throughout it, including delivery of her child alone. And this is just a summary! And there ain’t no happy ending either, folks.

Despite what may seem to be a depressing work, I found Mr. Morgan’s writing to be deeply evocative, not only in his descriptions of the hazards facing these characters (whom I cheered loudly throughout), but also in the joy of nature. Here’s an example:
“The trees was thinner at the ridge top and their limbs had already been stripped of leaves. I looked right up through the lightning shapes of the limbs to the blue sky…Through the gray lightning of the limbs I looked right into the deep sky.
“Now it was the strangest thing to look deeper and deeper into the blue. Most times you look into the sky and just see haze and blue. Unless there is clouds and you look past the clouds. But this time I looked into the clear sky and saw the DEPTH in the sky. I looked past the clear air into the furthest miles of air, and still deeper where the air was thinning out to nothing. I looked until I could see nothing but emptiness, out toward the stars, though I couldn’t see the stars in daylight.”

I greatly enjoyed this book, and indeed I have obtained its sequel, “The Road from Gap Creek,” narrated by Julie’s daughter Annie. Looking forward to more struggles, pluckiness and adaptation to a changing world. Five stars for “Gap Creek,” highly recommended.

I went to Oprah's book club to find some new reads and happened on Morgan. I was attracted to this because it takes place in the Appalachians.

His writing is very poetical and descriptive, with an almost musical lilt to some of his writing. Add to that the country way of speaking that lends a charm of it's own.

"The ground was deep in fresh-fell leaves, and leaves sparkled like they was waxed and oiled. I kicked up a cloud of leaves. I kicked up a fog of new-fell leaves. I kicked away the leaves in front of me like deep fresh snow. Leaves swarmed around my head, clicking as they touched. I waved my arms and swatted them away. I danced with the leaves and made them swirl faster. I laughed out loud and laughed at the top of my voice. I caught leaves in my apron and pitched them away."

Julie is such a strong character, and she helped me feel how hard it was to live and survive back not too long ago. There was lots of work that had to be done, like it or not. And Julie just kept doing the next thing, even when it seemed impossible.

There's a strength in all of us that we'll never realize til we're pushed to our limit and made to pull out every bit of grit and gumption. It's very empowering to get to that point and then through it. It builds you up for the next hard thing you'll have to face.

This book takes you on the journey with Julie.

A story of the hardships involved in making a young couples marriage in appalachia work, at the turn of the century. Loved the ending, hated the trials to get there. Robert Morgan's captures the world through the eyes of adolescent girl and her trials in being a women in appalachia. Robert gives such apt discriptions of their world, you are transported back in time. What I find interesting is how he takes characters you do not like at first, and by the end are cheering for.

I thought this one started strong but ended weak. The subtitle is "The Story of a Marriage," but I don't find that accurate, since the story doesn't follow the marriage through--we only get a glimpse at the very beginnings of a marriage. I expected, based on the title, to get the whole story, and I feel a bit jipped. Also, the further along I got, the more I skimmed because I started getting bored. Overall, though, I enjoyed the story, and I think MOrgan accurately portrays the Appalachian lifestyle at the turn of the century, and I am always interested in stories that capture what life was like there then. I also appreciate the depiction of a strong female character.