Reviews

San Francisco Chronicle – May 13, 2007
“At first glance, Ron Rash’s double-wide world of snapping serpents, wounded women, expired expectations and Pentecostal penance appears firmly set in the “scraggly-assed pine trees” and red-dirt landscape of the South. Yet the culture represented in Chemistry resembles that of any number of rural American settings. Rash’s stories are expertly told with a poet’s eye for language. A few hours with Rash will remind readers that this nation, despite its seeming prosperity and endless opportunity, still has places off the grid — and not just in the South — where it is simply enough to hang on for another day.” – Stephen J. Lyons

Publishers Weekly – January 22, 2007
“Haunting… An award-winning Southern novelist, short story writer, and poet, Rash returns to short fiction with 13 snapshots of contemporary Appalachia. The setups are imaginative, and Rash gets the feelings right.”

— Booklist
Rash, a poet and novelist (The World Made Straight 2006) steeped in Appalachia, offers 13 haunting and picturesque stories that illuminate the terms of survival in that often forgotten landscape. An apt encapsulation of a hardscrabble world, tinged with loyalty and love, but ruled by hard justice and revenge.
Deborah Donovan.