The Girl from Stretchneck Holler: Inside Appalachia - Softcover

What is so fascinating about Appalachia? Everything. The Appalachia is a state of mind-a place both physical and spiritual. A place people leave and long to return to. A place that shapes the thoughts and actions of those living there or who have ever lived there. A place in the heart. A place of violence, abject poverty, and natural rugged beauty. A place of horrible strife, survival, and resilience. Buried deep in the hollers of the Appalachian Mountains is the symbol of a group of struggling working-class people pitted against coal barons. The growth of the coal culture-a culture colored by violence and killings, by threats, by abuse, and by the rape of mountains-has forced a reclusive, independent, tenacious people into subservience. They serve the coal that provides their livelihood, but the consequences are great. Rising out of this state of colonialism is male dominance which is an accepted norm. Sons learn from their fathers. Daughters learn from their mothers. The pattern of domestic abuse is prevalent up and down the hollers as the culture flaw repeats itself generation after generation. Behind the walls of the little four-room houses stuck on the side of a hill are many hidden secrets. Children raised in the Appalachian coal culture become a product of their environment. This collection of short stories is told through the moving letters of two women who tell the stories of their rising from this upbringing and beautifully serve as windows to the souls of those hidden children of the mountains.