Having grown up in the foothills of Appalachia, I find myself attracted to books like Gods of Howl Mountain by Taylor Brown that are set in the region. The author collects the colorful parts of the region in his book set in 1950s North Carolina from the snake-handling preacher to the competing bootleggers and the house of prostitution.Be aware that the language and scenes fit the storyline.
The central character, Rory Docherty, returns from the Korean War missing one leg to run whisky in an old Ford coupe and spend nights returning to the horrors of war in his dreams. He lives with his folk-healer grandmother since his mother is in a mental institution, not having spoken since a hidden tragedy some years before. To add to the mystery, he falls for the young daughter of the snake-handling preacher.
The writing fits the tradition of Appalachian writers with this sample describing getting ready to kill hogs. “She had the fire crackling and smoking as the dawn light broke jagged over the hills. Rory set the pot on the fire and began sloshing it full of water hand-pumped from the well. He carried two pails with each trip, the water quivering like silver discs as he rocked his way across the yard.” The killing itself is just as graphic, if not as lyrical.
The book will probably not educate you or make you a better person, but it may bring some surprising sympathy for the bootlegger or the grandmother who ran the house of ill repute. If you are a writer, it will certainly give a model of how to turn a phrase.