Crapalachia

Stories can actually rearrange continents if they're told long enough. It's actually in the Bible. Matthew 15:6-7 states, “If you only had the faith of mustard seeds and stories - we could move mountains and the location of gas stations.”

This was the last book I bought at Blacksburg Books before we moved out of Virginia. (If you're in the area, go check it out! I miss that bookstore.) I mostly bought it for the title, if I'm being honest.

Set in West Virginia, and mostly a memoir? Ish? Another reviewer called this “autofiction” and that feels apt, because it's definitely mostly nonfic, but McClanahan clearly took some liberties (which he explains extensively in the afterword). The writing is melancholic, sometimes sarcastic, often pretending not to care about what's going on around him. Still, many of the short chapters end with searing clarity.

The first half, mostly about his extended family in Danese, WV, definitely feels stronger than the second half. It almost turns more stream-of-consciousness in its delivery in the second half, where it focuses on McClanahan moving in with his high-school buddy. I definitely was more interested in the family stuff than the crap of teenage boys.

CW: infant death/miscarriage (in the past; mention of tiny graves), suicide/suicidal ideation, obsessive-compulsive disorder, ableism, homophobia.