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Annie Jones
Your message amplified. Ready to share your message with the world? Start your podcast journey with podbean. Podbean podbean podbean Podbean the AI powered all in one podcast platform. Thousands of businesses and enterprises trust Podbean to launch their podcasts. Launch your podcast on podbean today. My school uses Podbean. My church too. I love it. I really do. Welcome to from the Front Porch, a conversational podcast about books, small business, and life in the south. The 20 acres of land on the east side of Still Lake. That's what I knew. That's the one thing I'd always assume assumed I'd understand. I knew the red and white pine on the hilltop, the quaking aspen and birch closer to shore. I knew the honeysuckle and chipmunks and sunset views of the lake that weren't worth very much in the end to developers. Emily Friedland History of Wolves I'm Annie Jones, owner of the Bookshelf, an independent bookstore in beautiful downtown Thomasville, Georgia, and this week we're back with an installment of our podcast series into the Backlist. If you're a new or newish listener, you might not realize that from the Front Porch is a production of the Bookshelf, a small, independently owned bookstore in rural South Georgia. By listening to our show and recommending it to friends, you're helping keep our indie bookstore in business. And if you like what you hear, one way you can financially support us is through Patreon. This month we are launching our 2025 Conquer, a classic reading of Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes. For $5 a month, you can access those monthly recaps as well as our Porch visits, which are monthly live Q&As where we talk about everything from pop culture to nail polish to what books you should take on your next vacation. To learn more about Patreon tiers and benefits, you can visit patreon.com from the FrontPorch A new year is a to commit your support. We'd love for you to join us over there. Now back to the show, because from the Front Porch is a podcast very much wrapped up in the comings and goings of our indie bookstore. Many of the books we feature on the show are new, or many times they're not even yet released books, which means backlist titles. Books published more than a year ago can sometimes get lost or overlooked. We launched the podcast series into the Backlist last January after I got to thinking about the magic of indie bookstores and how we try all the time to replicate that in store magic for you, our long distance customer and podcast listener. One of the most magical things to me about shopping in an indie bookstore is the serendipitous nature of it. How you might stumble upon a book you've never seen before and be inspired to read it or buy it because of an in store recommendation or simply because the book begs to be read from the shelf. Now don't get me wrong, I still get that serendipitous feeling from new titles, but it seems to especially come from an unsung book, a book that's been out for a while, or a book that only that particular store seems to know about. You can really tell, I think, a store's personality by what backlist titles they carry. So now every so often I dig through the imaginary Bookshelf vault. I do picture the Disney Vault Bookshelf Vault, and I highlight the backlist titles I think are special books we keep on our shelves even though they were published years ago. Books we secretly hope a customer stumbles upon, asks us about, and eventually takes home for themselves. If you are new to this series, maybe you're joining from the front porch listening in the new year you can find past into the backlist episodes I've discussed. Let's see, how many of these have we done? I think this is our fifth installment of this series, so you can go back and listen to episode 460 where we discussed Francis and Bernard, episode 465 where we talked about the ensemble, episode 476 where we discussed the mothers, and episode 499 where we talked about defending Jacob. Today for episode 513, I'm talking about Emily Friedland's debut novel, History of Wolves. Now this is unusual, but I do want to just give a little heads up that content warnings, it should be noted, may abound in this episode. In this dark work of literary fiction, we are introduced to Linda, a woman now in her late 30s, looking back on a transformative summer from her teen years. Perhaps you think it's funny that I, a seasonal reader, am recommending a summer book in the dead of winter. And that is simply because this book does not at all feel like a summer book. The COVID is wintry, the setting is wintry. Linda lives on an abandoned commune in northern Minnesota, and it's the descriptions of that cold, wintry place that have stuck with me all these years after reading it. Truly, there's a scene in this book where Linda's hair freezes because she washes it, or it's Wet, and she doesn't dry it before going outside. And it had never occurred to me, a born and bred Southerner, that you could freeze your hair like that was shocking to me. And there are lots of little details like that in this book. Linda reads like a girl from a fairy tale. Her parents may not be her biological parents, it's kind of hard to say. And she lives a pretty solitary existence in those Minnesota woods. She's an outcast at school and a girl without a real place until a little boy named Paul moves in across the lake. We know from the moment the book begins, and this is where some of those content warnings come into play that young Paul is deceased. He's dead. His death has clearly had an impact on Linda, who's now an adult. It takes the span of the entire novel to discover what happened to Paul. And yet History of Wolves is not in my mind at all a thriller, nor is it later a courtroom drama. Instead, I do think the most accurate description is that it is Linda's coming of age. And Paul and his parents and their religious beliefs play a part in the woman she ultimately becomes. As we watch the drama quietly unfold, we also become privy to some other unsettling aspects of Linda's life. She's obsessed with a pretty popular girl at school named Lily, as well as with her new history teacher, Mr. Grierson. As adult readers, we can kind of tell that something could be off with Mr. Grierson and quite frankly, with Lily and Linda, too. But the novel takes its time uncovering. Exactly. And it's only later that parallels between these two seemingly desperate storylines, the story of Paul and the story of Mr. Grierson, are revealed, and how both of those things from Linda's adolescence clearly are like the defining moments that turn her into the adult she is today. I opened my copy of History of Wolves. It's a beautiful deckled edge hardback edition. And a bookmark from Joseph Fox Bookshop in Philadelphia spun out. This is another reason I love doing this backlist series. Opening these books is like opening up my own life's time capsule. This is why you should always leave bookmarks in your book. Of course, we all know I'm a little bit of a pigpen, I think, when it comes to my literal and physical books. And so for me, that sometimes means a gum wrapper comes out or, you know, a dog eared page, of course is marked. But I love when I buy books from specific bookstores, leaving the bookmarks in there after I'm done so I can remember where I bought the book. Why I picked it up. So I purchased this book in the winter of 2017 on a trip to Philadelphia, and one year later it became my second book of 2018 to have completed. If you are a reader who has a lengthy TBR or you go to independent bookstores and you buy books and then you wonder, am I ever going to read that book? The answer for me is often yes. It might take you a minute. It took me a year to pick this one up off my shelf after purchasing it, but I did read it and it remains on my shelf to this day. It's not one that I wound up giving away or putting in the little free library. I did struggle in my initial review to describe History of Wolves. I was unwilling to fully categorize it as a thriller, which isn't surprising. I didn't want to describe it as a thriller today. But I also, also back in 2018 did not want to describe it as a coming of age story. I actually back then recorded Instagram story reviews. You can go deep into the Instagram archives and find some of them. And so I watched past Annie struggle to describe this book and I really was hesitant to describe it as a coming of age. Which is interesting because now flipping through it today and doing some research, I think that's very clearly what it is. But back then I wasn't quite sure how to categorize it. And I wound up saying, if you like genre hopping fiction with complex and complicated characters and a deep sense of place, this one's for you. In fact, now here we are. I don't know what, seven years, seven years removed. What sticks out to me from History of Wolves is not the coming of age story. It's not Linda, it's not Paul, it's not Paul's parents. It is the Minnesota setting. I have vivid and distinct memories of reading this cold and wintry book in January of 2018. And that's what sticks out. That's why I wanted to talk about this book today. So because Linda is an adult when she narrates the novel, we the reader are never quite sure how reliable a narrator she actually is. She's looking back on a formative summer and who's to say if those memories are accurate or not? You can tell she's trying to make sense of the stories she's lived and the ones she's told herself. Even in the opening pages when Linda who her name, her given name is Maddie. She now calls herself Linda. She called herself Linda back then. So when Linda Maddie is reflecting On a past teacher she calls into question her own memory. This is a quote from the book. He once showed us a picture of Russia's last emperor. And that's how I think of him now. Black bearded, tassel shouldered. Though in fact Mr. Adler was always clean shaven and plodding. It's the novel's opening pages that actually brought it to the attention of publishers. The first chapter is 17 pages long and Emily Friedland published it, I think, in the Southwest Review. That chapter won the McGinnis Richie Award in 2013. And that success ultimately led Friedland to decide to tell more of the story, leading of course to the publication in 2017. So it's that first chapter and it really does hook you. I mean that first chapter. I sat and read it today and it is. It's stunning. All these years later, it's the writing of History of Wolves that has stuck with me. That setting, that Minnesota setting, and then the writing itself. Even in my decal edged copy, I could spot my torn edges where I mark quotes that I couldn't bear to lose. So I'm going to read a few for you. The first is when Linda Maddie is going to her new teacher, Mr. Grierson. He's decided he wants her to participate in this history project and she tells him she wants to do a project on the history of wolves. What? A history of wolves? He was puzzled. Then he shook his head and grinned. Right. You're a 14 year old girl. The skin punched up around his eyes. You all have a thing for horses and wolves. I love that. I love that. That is so weird. What is that about? Winter collapsed on us that year. It knelt down exhausted and stayed. In the middle of December, so much snow fell that the gym roof buckled and school was canceled for a week. I'm turning my page, my pages in my book so I can read this one. That was the description of winter, then summer. You know how summer goes. You yearn for it and yearn for it, but there's always something wrong. Everywhere you look there are insects thickening the air and birds rifling trees and enormous heavy leaves dragging down branches. You want to trammel it, wreck it, smash things down. The afternoons are so fat and long. You want to see if anything you do matters. Doesn't that just describe a childhood or an adolescent summer? Okay, last quote. It seemed to be my turn to speak. He was waiting. You mean. I mean, you have to ask yourself from the beginning, what do you think you know? History of Wolves is divided into two sections. There are chapters so don't panic. Two sections though, Science and Health. The first section is filled with Linda's recollections of that memorable, awful summer, the summer in which Paul dies. And then the second chapter offers more, maybe of her adult perspective, and we get more of a sense of who she is in adulthood and what's happened in her life since that summer. The book opens with a quote from Mary Baker Eddy, who you might be familiar with. She was the founder of the Church of Christ, scientist and History of Wolves grapples heavily with religious belief and the various forms and action it can take. I can see so often when I pick these books for the backlist episodes. I can see a through line in the books that I love. And in many ways History of Wolves is reminiscent of the Essex Serpent or even Miracle Creek by Angie Kim, where the beliefs of the parents take a toll and the consequences for those beliefs are paid for by the children. As I mentioned earlier in the episode, content warnings do abound with this particular title. It is a dark, unsettling novel dealing with child death, generational trauma, and even to some extent, pedophilia and pornography. I can see how my personal tastes have evolved over the years. I think my love for literary fiction struggled during the pandemic, and it's been hard to find my rhythm with those heavier works. And I wasn't sure if I'd be drawn to a book like History of Wolves today. But as I opened it and began turning pages, and as is so often the case with me, I found myself drawn right back in. The storytelling is really remarkable and the writing is stellar. The characters are complicated with a capital C. But if you can handle the heavier subject matter, I really do think you'll find yourself immersed like I was every episode. Every into the backlist episode we do. I like to do some stats, so here are some stats, some critical reviews, et cetera for you. This book was published initially on January 3, 2017. It's 288 pages. It's a fast book, it is character driven, so it's not going to be for everyone. But stuff does happen. I mean, the book opens and even though this is not a thriller, the book opens with you knowing a character has died and you naturally want to know what has happened to him. So it's kind of, of course, a sneaky, manipulative thing Emily Friedland does, but it immediately keeps you reading. And so 288 pages is nothing. I mean, I flew through this one back when I read it the first time and I see how you could settle in and read it quite quickly now as well. The critics consensus is interesting because it received pretty much rave reviews when it was released. But the first review I came across was the New York Times review by author Jennifer Senior, and boy, her review was pretty blistering, at least to my to my eye she is in the minority, but it was her review was was harsh, at least for me. Here's part of it History of Wolves contains the kernels of many possible novels with lots of larger ideas to plumb how all children become hostages to their parents dogma in some way. How strange it is that we should implicitly trust people we don't know well how family is and is not defined by flesh and blood. It's not what you think, but what you do that matters, linda says at one point, summing up one of the book's central moral lessons. Mrs. Friedland might take this advice to heart, though in a slightly different way. All the ideas in the world can't make a great novel. It's what you do with them that matters. That is some burn, isn't it? Phew. That last paragraph I was like, that is brutal. She of course in her review marks out the complaints and the issues that she has with the book. I think she does feel like Friedland is a little bit manipulative in her storytelling. I did not feel that way. This was a four star book for me. But man, Jennifer Sr. Was not impressed. Now Kirkus and Publishers Weekly were impressed. There was a starred review in Publishers Weekly. This is a quote from that review. A sense of foreboding subtly permeates the story as Friedland slowly reveals what happened to Paul. Her wordsmithing is fantastic, rife with vivid turns of phrase. Friedland has elegantly crafted a striking protagonist whose dark leanings cap off the tragedy at the heart of this book, which is moving and disturbing and which will stay with the reader. This book did stay with me and in my initial Instagram post the comments frequently said, oh, this book was dark, but I really appreciate it. I really liked it. Kirkus also gave it a starred review. It's rare, I think, that Kirkus and Publishers Weekly are in alignment. But this time they were, the Kirkus reviewer writes. As dread coils around Linda, the novel gives up its secrets slowly. One concerns an 8th grade teacher accused of owning child porn. Another is tangled in the Newcomer family's Christian Science beliefs. Friedland circles these threads around each other in tightening, mesmerizing loops. The novel has a tinge of fairy tale, wavering on the blur between good and evil, thought and action, but the sharp consequences for its characters make it singe and sing. A literary tour de force. The Kirkus Review also talks a lot about the nature writing in this book and so of all the opinions, I think the Kirkus Review is the one that probably most matches my view. Although again, it should be noted this was not a five star book for me. I think I found it unsettling that there's no pretty bow here and perhaps that Contributed to my four star opinion of it. It's 3.41 stars on Goodreads. It's got 28,000 ratings and 3,700 reviews, which is honestly more than I would have thought. But it was an indie Next pick in 2017. It was beloved by indie bookstores that year, probably why I found it on the shelves at an indie bookstore that year. It was also shortlisted for the Booker, so it was definitely a critical darling. My one sentence hand sell for this book is History of Wolves is a brutal coming of age about one adolescent Minnesota summer and its impact on one woman's adulthood. This is my favorite part. I would put this book on the shelf with the following 10 titles. So if I was crafting an end cap around History of Wolves, here's what would be on the end cap and this is to me, how you will know if this book is for you or not. These Silent woods by Kimmy Cunningham Grant Salvage the Bones by Jesmyn Ward Miracle Creek by Angie Kim Swamplandia by Karen Russell Lay youy Body down by Amy Suter Clark Stealing by Margaret Vrbel the Net Beneath Us by Carol Dunbar Bewilderment by Richard Powers, Burial Rites by Hannah Kent and the upcoming Penitents by Kristin Koval. I've already said I had a lot of quotes and underlines and markings in this book, but I think this is my favorite quote. By their nature it came to me Children were freaks. They believed impossible things to suit themselves, thought their fantasies were the center of the world. They were the best kinds of quacks if that's what you wanted. Pretenders who didn't know they were pretending at all. Y'all, Isn't that genius? Is that not good? That's such good writing. That is such good writing. I can't get over it. I think you'll want to read this if you like darkly satisfying, critically acclaimed, character driven fiction that deals with the consequences of parenthood and memory, all while wrapped in beautiful nature writing. Is there a TV and film adaptation of this? No, but I think there could or should be. I really do. And then I put two links to a couple of author interviews in the show notes in case you want to do some more reading. I'm so intrigued that I checked today and Emily Friedland has not published anything since the release of this book, which is always. Gosh, I'm always so curious about. So anyway you can hear or see read rather a couple of author interviews. She did one with Powell's books that I thought was pretty good, so that is History of Wolves. It's just a quick little sneak peek, I guess into that particular backlist title. I hope it has piqued your interest. I always want books to find exactly the right people and I think this book is probably a five star read for somebody. It was a four star read for me. I think it's excellent and I can't wait to hear what you think of it if you decide to pick it up. This week I'm reading the Snowbirds by Christina Clancy from the Front Porch is a weekly podcast production of the Bookshelf, an independent bookshelf bookstore in Thomasville, Georgia. You can follow the Bookshelf's daily happenings on Instagram ookshelftville and all the books from today's episode can be purchased online through our store website bookshelf thomasville.com a full transcript of today's podcast episode can be found at. From the frontporchpodcast.com Special thanks to Studio D Podcast Production for production of from the Front Porch and for our theme music, which sets the perfect warm and friendly tone for our Thursday conversations. Our executive producers of today's episode are Kami Tidwell, Chantal Carle, Kate O'Connell, Kristin May, Linda Lee Drost, Jean Queens, Amanda Wickham, Martha Stacey Lau, Chancellor Combs, Stephanie Dean, Ashley Farrell, Nicole Marshall, Wendy Jenkins, Lori Johnson, Susan Mulings. Thank you all for your support of from the Front Porch. If you'd like to support from the Front Porch, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts. Your input helps us make the show even better and helps us reach new listeners. All you have to do is open up the podcast app on your phone. Look for from the Front Porch. Scroll down until you see. Write a review and tell us what you think. Or if you're so inclined, support us. Over on Patreon, where we have three levels of support. Each level has an amazing number of benefits like bonus content, access to live events, discounts and giveaways. Just go to patreon.com from the front Porch we're so grateful for you and we look forward to meeting back here next week.