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Critics' Opinion:
Readers' Opinion:
First Published:
Oct 2004, 288 pages
Paperback:
Oct 2005, 288 pages
Book Reviewed by:
BookBrowse Review Team
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A rich, coming of age tale set during the boom and bust years of an immigrant coal mining town in 19th-century California.
In this mesmerizing first novel by a gifted young writer, the drama of California's rich immigrant history and
the freshness and wonder of childhood combine with darker elements of legend,
magic and mystery. Pulitzer Prize winning author Robert Olen Butler calls it
"a startling accomplishment . . . an enchanting novel by a lushly talented
young writer." Tom Franklin, author of Hell at the Breech, says,
"Cunningham is a writer we'll be hearing a lot more from." And Laurel
Johnson of the Midwest Book Review calls it "a book to be savored .
. . It has my highest recommendation."
Born while the Civil War is raging further east, young Asher Witherow seems
marked for an extraordinary future. Anything but typical, he captures the
attention of the eerily watchful apprentice minister and schoolteacher, Josiah
Lyte, and of young Thomas Motion, a strange boy who can see into the deepest
darkness.
When Thomas mysteriously vanishes, only Asher knows the truth of what has
happened to him, and he must decide whether to keep his knowledge secret or
reveal what he believes to be his own unforgivable mistake. It is an agonizing
moral decision that will forever affect the lives of those closest to him and
that will ultimately have a profound impact on all of Nortonville.
In breathtaking language that contrasts the striking landscape of
California's Diablo Valley with the harsh details of life in an 1870s
coal-mining boom town, M. Allen Cunningham takes us to an extraordinary time and
place. It is a time when the brutal hardships of daily life are leavened by a
sense of miraculous change just around the corner. It is a place of sensual,
almost supernatural beauty, peopled with remarkable characters—like the highly
unconventional Lyte, the "pagan" midwife Sarah Norton and Asher's
beloved friend and closest confidante, the otherworldly Anna Flood.
Impeccably imagined, sensitive and real in its portrayal of a young boy
confronting unanswerable questions with grace and strength, The Green Age of
Asher Witherow is a remarkable book that convincingly shatters the equation
of childhood and innocence.
The force that through the green fuse drives the flower
Drives my green age; that blasts the roots of trees
Is my destroyer.
And I am dumb to tell the crooked rose
My youth is bent by the same wintry fever.
—Dylan Thomas
The supply seems to be inexhaustible. From the figures in my
possession I have reasons to believe that over 2,250,000 tons of coal have been
shipped to the market from the Diablo mines; and considerably more than half of
that immense amount was shipped from the Black Diamond mines at Nortonville.
Where is the mine in the State that can show a better record in regard to the
past, or as bright a prospect for the future?
—Letter from Nortonville, Contra Costa Gazette, June 28, 1880
On a boggy day in 1806 a detachment of Spanish soldiers
apprehended a band of Bay Miwok Indians in a marsh at the foot of a solitary
California mountain. Commanded to redeliver the natives to the stern grace of
the mission they'd fled, the Spaniards detained them...
This is one of those books where the whole is so much greater than the sum of the parts that I fear to give you details from the plot, so all I can do is encourage you to read the excerpt for yourself and decide if this might be a good choice for you...continued
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(Reviewed by BookBrowse Review Team).
Robert Olen Butler, author of the Pulitzer Prize winning A Good Scent From a Strange Mountain
Rarely does a writer combine a strikingly beautiful prose style with an
unerring instinct for storytelling. But this is indeed M. Allen Cunningham's
startling accomplishment—in his literary debut, no less. The Green Age of
Asher Witherow is an enchanting novel by a lushly talented young writer. Steve Yarbrough, author
The Green Age of Asher Witherow is one of the finest debut novels I've
ever read. Cunningham writes with poetic intensity, but this is also a book with
enormous narrative drive, memorable characters and relentless drama. And while
the author is an artist rather than a scholar, he serves up a wealth of
fascinating information about the history of the Golden State. For a
twenty-six-year-old novelist to produce this book ought to be impossible, but
you hold the shocking evidence in your hands. Tom Franklin, author of Hell at the Breach
he writing in The Green Age of Asher Witherow is beautiful, the details enviable, the landscapes amazing, the characters well-drawn. It's like this guy is 200 years old, he gets it so right. Cunningham is a writer we'll be hearing a lot more from.Between 1830 and 2000 more than 15,000 people were killed in USA mines. I assume similar historic figures could be found for any coal mining country. For example, in Britain over 90,000 men, women and children lost their lives or were injured in mines between 1850 and 1914 (for a comprehensive resource of UK mining information see DiggingUpThePast.org.uk). Today, in industrialized countries, coal mining deaths and accidents have been much reduced because machines have taken over from the men and boys who used to work the coal face; deaths do still occur; for example the 2001 explosion in Brookwood, Alabama that killed 13; and there are health issues related to mining coal. However, this ...
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