Why did I love this book?
When I reached the end of The Lacuna, I cried out five times in surprise and wonder. No other author has made me do that, so when I heard about Demon Copperhead, I had to read it.
Let a book whisk me off somewhere I’ve never been and I’m happy. Usually this is a fantasy world, but with Demon Copperhead, it’s Appalachia America and a people forgotten, ignored, or misunderstood. I wanted to get lost in Damon’s world, with all the colorful characters, who I already knew from Dickens’s David Copperfield but was also meeting for the first time as Kingsolver put a modern spin on them.
It was doubly fun watching Damon’s journey unfold while having Dickens’s plot in my mind. I kept telling myself, “This should win a Pulitzer.” Lo and behold, it did!
81 authors picked Demon Copperhead as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.
Demon's story begins with his traumatic birth to a single mother in a single-wide trailer, looking 'like a little blue prizefighter.' For the life ahead of him he would need all of that fighting spirit, along with buckets of charm, a quick wit, and some unexpected talents, legal and otherwise.
In the southern Appalachian Mountains of Virginia, poverty isn't an idea, it's as natural as the grass grows. For a generation growing up in this world, at the heart of the modern opioid crisis, addiction isn't an abstraction, it's neighbours, parents, and friends. 'Family' could mean love, or reluctant foster…