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Named the 2001 Independent Publishers Books Award Storyteller of the
Year.
978-0-89587-263-0
0-89587-263-3
$15.95 paperback
6" x 9"
311 pages
Click
here to obtain
a copy of this title's
reading group guide.
Also by Charles F. Price: Freedom's Altar. |
Hamby McFee dreams of leaving
the valley of the Hiwassee in western North Carolina, and cockfighting
is his means to that end. A renowned trainer of some of the meanest
birds in the pit, he rests his hopes on the aged, much-feared Gouger,
the apricot-tinted Pile-Driver, and the strangely calm, lightning-quick
Buttermilk.
As the mulatto ex-slave of
the Curtis family, Hamby practices a loyalty he seldom feels. Fifteen
years after the Civil War, he still inhabits the farm where he was once
chattel. As Andy Curtis, the leader of the household, drifts into
insanity and his once-lovely sister Rebecca withers on the vine, Hamby
finds himself assuming all the responsibilities of a landowner without
reaping any of the benefits.
The other thread of the story
involves Ves Price, the son of a close friend of the Curtis family.
Hampered by a lack of good sense, Ves makes enemies in high places
during his failed effort at moonshining. Then he turns informant for the
Revenue and becomes more hated still.
When moonshiner king Web
Darling imprisons him in his mountaintop fortress, it appears Ves is
doomed. But Hamby McFee, who holds a grudge against Darling, swiftly
arranges a climatic chicken fight on the king's home ground. In it, and
with considerable reluctance, he will discover just how deeply his home
and friends lie in his heart.
Readers of The Cock's Spur
will recognize a few familiar characters from Charles F. Price's
award-winning Freedom's Altar. And they will be delighted to meet
the new faces--the Cherokee Longrunner, willing Katie Shuford, war hero
Irish Bill Moore, hard-edged Revenue deputy Tuck Richbourg--in what is
undeniably Price's best novel yet.
about the author
Charles F. Price's second novel, Freedom's
Altar, won the 1999 Sir Walter Raleigh Award, given to the best
work of fiction by a North Carolinian. Price worked as a journalist,
urban planner, management consultant, and Washington lobbyist before
publishing the acclaimed Hiwassee: A Novel of the Civil War in
1996. He lives in his native western North Carolina mountains, where he
is a full-time writer and teacher. The Cock's Spur is his third
book.
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