Power in the Blood: An Odyssey of Discovery in the American South - Softcover

Mays, John Bentley

3.29

7 ratings by Goodreads

9780060929572: Power in the Blood: An Odyssey of Discovery in the American South

Softcover

ISBN 10: 006092957X ISBN 13: 9780060929572

Publisher: Harper Perennial, 1998

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John Bentley Mays left the American South because, like many members of his generation, he believed a larger, more interesting life awaited him beyond his ancestral land . . .

Decades later the death of Mays's aunt Vandalia summoned him back to Louisiana. He began to explore the secrets of Vandalia's house and his own past, and experienced a reawakening of feelings about his heritage--and the stereotypes and contradictions that exist in today's South. Moving through the Virginia tidewater forests, colonial plantations, and rural towns in South Carolina, Mississippi, and Louisiana where Mays's antebellum relatives lived throughout 400 years of American history, Power in the Blood is a poignant memoir composed during the course of one man's quest for truth.

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About the Author:

John Bentley Mays lives in Toronto with his wife and daughter. He is also the author of Power in the Blood; An Odyssey of Discovery in the American South.

Review:

"In writing about his won family, Mays has illuminated a much larger experience, one that is rigorously researched and poetically rendered. Power in the Blood dispels the myths surrounding the South and demonstrates that the truth can hold the same elegiac allure." -- The Globe and Mail

"John Bentley Mays is one of the most powerful voices to speak of and out of the Deep South. Power in the Blood chronicles a journey of immense poignancy and resonance." -- Anne Rivers Siddons

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