American Pop audiobook

Earlier that week, when he was explaining that Maximilian Everard controlled more than a fifth of the votes in the state via his sway over his white friends who in turn held sway over the Negro tenants farming their land, Paul Johnson had warned Montgomery about the evening they were going to spend at Bluest Heaven, noting, “Those boys there will be true Delta.” Monty had understood the phrase to refer to any white plantation owner from the “Valley of the Lower Mississippi” who was socially entitled, financially comfortable and, as if Zeno had devised a paradox concerning Kentucky bourbon, perpetually fixed halfway between sober and drunk. He knew those weren’t the only paradoxes of their breed. True Deltans were also, simultaneously, ostentatious and genteel, careful of debt but careless with risk, patrician planters and rugged frontiersmen, as hedonisticly liberal as they were politically conservative—the most Mississippian of Mississippians. In the main parlor, a semicircular room with ceilings eighteen feet high and alcoves built into the walls to exhibit marble statuary, Monty was introduced to a group of men who made him realize he’d barely understood the half of it. American Pop follows a century, or so, of America through the experiences of the Forster family, from the arrival of paterfamilias, Tewksbury, a doctor transformed by immigration into a pharmacist, to Houghton, his ambitious, hard-working son, the one who came up with the formula for what would become the best-selling carbonated drink in the nation, to his children, Montgomery, the politician with a secret, Lance, very bright, but with a talent for self-doubt and destruction, Ramsey, Lance’s twin, with secrets of her own, one of which will kill her, and Harold, the innocent of the crew, possessed of a sweet nature, and a deficit of understanding. And then there is the generation after them, with complications and challenges aplenty. Snowden Wright - image from his Twitter page The opening scene is a tracking shot, an operatic overture, the reader’s eye following this Forster, until another enters the scene, then we follow that one until he or she changes direction and we spy another, until we have met them all, or most anyway, and been offered a snippet of who they all are. It is breathtaking. I can hardly wait to see it done properly on screen. It’s a big story, an American story, but with seven-league boots that take us to Europe, South America, and Asia, from the trenches of World War I in northern France to stylish Paris on the eve of another war, from Hollywood to Greenwich Village. There are Doughboys and Nazis, socialites and Senators, smoke-filled rooms and a “This-is-the-way-it-is” scene worthy of Ned Beatty as Arthur Jensen in Network. But mostly it is a song of the South. The South has, to put it lightly, a fraught past, with slavery and the Civil War and, more recently, racism, misogyny, homophobia, and anti-intellectualism. We have a perpetual BOGO sale on social issues. In American Pop, I tried to grapple with those issues, not only as they relate to the South, but also as they relate to the country as a whole. There’s a reason I didn’t title the novel Southern Pop. The South’s problems are also America’s problems, and that’s never been clearer than it is in our current political situation. - from The Millions interview An early cross-racial allegiance seemed a bit of a stretch to my 21st century eyes, but I could see it in an earlier age, in a way like the butler, Stevens’, dedication to Lord Darlington in The Remains of the Day. Romantic elements cross racial boundaries, some in a dark way, another in a more hopeful vein. There is a delicious scene in which a black driver offers his VIP passenger a vision of how black people see the reality the uppers create. And, as one would expect, there will be some coffee in the cream.Matters of love abound, from wind-blown trysts to the longing of a lifetime, from classic love of the usual sort, beautifully drawn, even celestial at times, to love of the forbidden sort, movingly, achingly portrayed. Love is found, lost, and appears in diverse sorts, from the romantic to the familial, from love of land to love of money and power, from love based on friendship to love based on admiration. Decisions, forks in the dirt road of characters’ life choices, turn on matters of the heart. Decades later, over drinks at The Brook one evening, William K. Vanderbilt II would jokingly ask, “What gave you the nerve to even try to land a Teague?” to which Houghton answered that it was the same thing that let their ancestors think about leaving the old country, the same thing that helped those first settlers wrest farmland from the wilderness, the same thing giving their waiter that look of defiance tempered with envy, but on August 6, 1890, the smell of honeysuckle flowers in the air and the taste of apple pulp on his lips, the most profundity Houghton could muster while kissing Annabelle was the thought, Thank God this happened sometime before I die. The book opens with a quote from Nathaniel Hawthorne: Families are always rising and falling in America. But, I believe, we ought to examine more closely the how and why of it, which in the end revolves around life and how you live it. When you cover a century of America you had better populate it with interesting characters or it might read like a history book. This American century begins in the 1870s and concludes in 1986. Tewksbury, who begins the family’s ascent, is a joyful character, not at all put out by being denied his profession in the New World. He finds another way, starting a pharmacy. His son, Houghton, as a young man, may put you in mind of George Bailey from It’s a Wonderful Life, a good-natured soul, with purpose, focus, and a work ethic most of us can only marvel at. It is no wonder he provides the rocket fuel for the Forsters’ ascent, becoming the scion of PanCola, our stand-in for Coke. Soda has always seemed to me such an American drink. It is to this country what wine is to France, tea to England, beer to Germany, or toilet water to misbehaving dogs. Soda is especially pervasive in the South, where I’m from and the region I love exploring, scrutinizing, praising, and criticizing in my work. As Nancy Lemann wrote in the sublime Lives of the Saints, “Southerners need carbonation.” Soda, I figured, would enable me to wed the national and the regional, America and the South, and examine the relationship between them. - from The Millions interviewThe failings of some of those who come after Houghton offer us a view of familial as well as corporate descent. There are costs to being rich, to being born into a family that rules a commercial empire, that is mentioned in the same breath as Hearsts and Rockefellers. There are expectations, and things that are not allowed, along with the means to erase evidence of dark deeds or errors, all existing within a world that proclaims its righteousness while often indulging in private excess. One thing I would have preferred for American Pop was for it to have been longer, not a common gripe. When Wright allows himself time to go at his characters at length the results are extraordinary. There is a smorgasbord of Forsters, by birth and marriage, to be sampled here, and I felt short-changed when each was not given as much attention as some others, seeing wonderful opportunities cut short. For a book of such broad scope to come in at (in my ARE) a mere 384 pages seems a slight to what might have been. Don’t get me wrong. I think this is a marvelous read, but it is so amazing at times that I wanted the same amazingness to have been applied more liberally to the characters who got less ink. Not much of a gripe, I know. (And one I expect might be addressed if this book is made into a TV mini-series. A theatrical film would, no doubt, cut characters rather than flesh them out.) There was one other item that jarred a bit. One character goes abroad as a way of filling a gap, recovering from serial disappointments. This seemed pretty clear, but Wright opted to tell us overtly exactly why this character was heading elsewhere. Seemed unnecessary, and a tort of telling over showing. There is a lot of flash-backing and flash-forwarding. Sometimes it worked perfectly, but at other times it seemed a shortcut in place of further writing about a character, spoilerish in a way. Wright gives the novel the patina of a family memoir. My first conception of the book was for it to be the opposite of Capote‘s “nonfiction novel” In Cold Blood. I wanted American Pop to be fictional nonfiction. To achieve that effect, I used certain techniques of nonfiction, such as source citations, quotes from interviews, and the use of specific dates and times, similar to what Michael Chabon did in The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay and Susanna Clarke in Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell. – from The Millions interviewIt is a story about story-telling, personal and global, and how our sense of who we are, our nostalgia, our supposedly shared values and history, constitute a concoction that, while it may have a foundation in the pure water of reality, of this-then-that, is flavored by the secret ingredients of lies, half-lies, and incomplete truths, with a splash of wickedness, and the effervescence of the truly marvelous. One of the first great books of 2019, it might be better to think of American Pop as American BOOM! Can I get another bottle please? On his way back downstairs, Robert passed a rare photograph from 1910’s notorious “PanCola Summit,” a weeklong motivational sales meeting. The photo featured hundreds of Panhandlers crowded in front of a platform. According to the expose “The Church of Pan, or the Cult of Pan?” written by a British reporter who infiltrated the event, it was less of a pep rally and more of an indoctrination, creating mindless automatons whose only goal in life was to sell sugar water. “This wasn’t the country I’d envisioned,” began the expose, if Robert remembered correctly. “It was the South, a country within a country. But which was more real, the exterior one or the interior, the body or the soul?” Review first posted – February 8, 2019Publication date – February 5, 2019December, 2019 - NPR names American Pop as one of their Best Books of 2019 =============================EXTRA STUFFLinks to the author’s personal, Twitter, GR, and FB pagesAmerican Pop is Wright’s second novel. His first, Play Pretty Blues (The Life of Robert Johnson), was published in 2013. His writing has appeared in Atlantic, Esquire, Salon, The Millions, the New York Daily News, Esquire, The Paris Review, and probably plenty more.The opening of the novel, read by Robert PetkoffInterviews-----Print – The Millions - Southern Discomfort: The Millions Interviews Snowden Wright - by Matt Burgess-----Print – Clarion Ledger - A soft drink empire, outrageous family, cola hunters: Snowden Wright on 'American Pop' - by Jana Hoops-----Audio – NPR - Author Snowden Wright Chronicles Fictional Southern Cola Dynasty In Novel 'American Pop' -----Audio – Writer’s Bone - Friday Morning Coffee: American Pop Author Snowden Wright - from about 6:00

Panola Cola, carbonated sugar water with a secret ingredient, is the quintessential American product that propels a Mississippi family into prominence. American Pop tells the multi-generational story of the Forster family as they rise and fall over the course of one hundred years. There are accidents, suicide, and struggles with sexuality, possible murder, questions of paternity and the ultimate loss of the family fortune. Employing a non-linear narrative, this novel jumps around in time, occasionally, with jarring speed. It possesses that dark strangeness singular to the south but it’s not quite Southern Gothic. There is a certain amount of humor but the characterization felt a bit thin. I would have liked to have spent more time with each character to get to know them better. And, it is curious that very little attention is paid to the cultural events of the twentieth century other than the world wars, perhaps the exceedingly wealthy live untouched by these things.

** spoiler alert ** **WARNING!!!! May Contain Spoiler Alerts!!**BOOK TITLE: American PopAUTHOR: Snowden WrightFORMAT: Paperback (ARC)PAGE COUNT: 386 pagesBOOK GENRE(S): family drama, fiction, historical fiction, realistic fiction, cultural-USA, location-USA**Categories for Rating**see post at my blog for rating system:https://the-book-nest.blogspot.com/20...A. Characters: 8/9B. Cover Art & Design: 9/9C. Enjoyment: 7.5/8 D. Plot (Storyline): 8/8E. Writing Style & Editing: 8/7.5F. Variable: Genre, Relating (optional): 8/9**Pros: Enjoyable, believable story, nice flow in/out of historical events in regards to how the family related to them and as a backdrop for the story. Characters had depth, and there were some societal taboos that came in to play, that added interest and intrigue to the overall book. Definite diversity between the characters, whether it was social background, race, sexual orientation, station in life and more.**Cons: It sometimes got a little ... wordy ... even though I understood that it was the author's way of giving the "old Southern genteel" feel to the way the story was being told.**Honorable Mentions: You could tell that the author did his homework not only in regards to the historical events, however also in regards to the rise of 'certain' soda companies ( ::cough cough:: ) and their falls, and using it as a sort of rivalry backdrop to the "sensation" of PanCola. At times it felt like I was actually reading non-fiction about Pepsi and/or Coca-Cola!!**Memorable Quote(s):His father pulled Branchwater into his arms and pressed his cheek against his son's hair. "Because both of you are my children. You and your brother. Don't you know that?" he said. "You can't choose who you love and neither can blood." He pushed his son's head back so he could look him directly in the eyes. "Blood doesn't make a family. Love does." **Personal Like/Dislike: Again, my only real "gripe" was the wordiness, however I *do* understand why it was written that way and appreciate the effort the author took to try and inject a feel of authenticity for the time frame of the book. I don't think I'd want to read a bunch of "wordy" books, however once in a great while ... not a big problem.**Does this book "fit in" to the genre(s) it's listed under? Yes, it does. Very much so.**Final Notes: I had received this book as part of a giveaway via the publisher, about 2 years ago. I am glad I finally took the time to read it, and sorry that it had taken so long. I want to say, the cover art is wonderful and really gives a good feel for the story that is found on the pages in between. The author has a superb skill for description, and for helping you feel like you were there, observing it all first-hand. While I am not a fast reader, I will say that, while the story overall is not fast-paced, it is steady, with very few - if any - real lulls. For those who enjoy historical fiction with some pop culture mixed in, with good characters, a solid story which moves as a steady - albeit not fast - pace, with a chuckle or two mixed in, I would recommend this book. I would caution, however, if you have issues (i.e. "triggers") with taboo issues such as inter-racial and/or same sex relationships, you might want to think before reading. While they are not all over the book, there are a few instances of both, however, they are very much a part of the story and helps to relay the importance of these connections within the overall historical setting(s).In closing, I'd like to thank the author and publisher for allowing me the opportunity to read this book via the giveaway. I understand that a review is/was not required, and I give honest review of my own Final Rating: 8.08 / 8.41 = 4 ⭐⭐⭐⭐ / 4.5 (rounded up to 5) ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐Notes on Rating: Overall, a fair rating. Not a lot of minuses to the overall book.This review can also be found here:https://the-book-nest.blogspot.com/20...

I adore this novel. I love the playfulness, dexterity, and beauty of Wright’s writing, and all of the gorgeous turns of phrase and tiny details in this book; I love the tragic depth of each of the Forster family members; I love the elastic way this novel plays with time, and the way Wright enlivens so many throwaway characters and details with a description a few sentence long of some detail of that person that we’ll never come back to, but which serve to enrich the world building that much more.This is one of two novels I find myself re-reading at least once a year, which I realized recently is my actual metric for what my favorite books are. Which ones do I want to come back to? Which ones make me happy to read or listen to? I can pretty confidently say this is my all-time favorite historical literary fiction novel.

Un secolo di storia ma soprattutto di cultura popolare americana poiché solo gli Stati Uniti possono essere immaginati e raccontati partendo da una semplice bevanda frizzante.Snowden Wright, in questo suo terzo libro, racconta le vicende della famiglia Forster, il cui unico scopo non è la ricchezza, il successo o l'ambizione bensì creare una stirpe capace di incarnare perfettamente il Ventesimo secolo.E tutti i membri della famiglia Forster, incarnano benissimo il mito e il sogno americano, racchiuso nella certezza che questa nazione garantisce vita, libertà e speranza ma in cambio chiede di lavorare sodo e i Forster, nel bene e nel male, lo fanno per tutta la loro intera esistenza.Questo libro è un affresco sincero, onesto e veritiero che restituisce un buon profilo, un'ottima ricostruzione storica e mette in moto una vera e propria macchina della nostalgia per un'America ormai perduta.In fondo, la vera protagonista di questo romanzo è proprio la Storia e i Forster, rappresentano solo il mito e l'emblema di una nazione ma soprattutto diventano una dinastia industriale che ha contribuito a rendere grandi gli Stati Uniti e perciò gli si può perdonare ogni cosa.Recensione completa: https://www.librofilia.it/american-po...

"The South had just the right blend of strangeness and darkness to fascinate and frighten children, didn't it? It was similar enough to the real world to make a child think, I know this place, yet also different for them to go to sleep at night knowing it was only make-believe...a juke joint...a fried-peanut stand..a deer-processing center...the world of his own childhood, the strangeness, darkness, and altogether fucked-up-ness that made him the incredibly well-adjusted person he was today."I devoured this in a weekend. Couldn't put it down. Snowden Wright: sho' can write. I found the--dare I say effervescent--narrative voice irresistible as this novel romped across over half of the twentieth century. My only criticism (I'm still not sure it's a fair one) is the relative glossing over of race relations, given this novel almost spans a century, and the arc of a Southern family who rockets to the top with the creation of a cola sensation. This is relatively light-hearted fare, but I found each character engaging, nonetheless. If Barry Hannah had written A Gentleman In Moscow this might come close.

Un arco di tempo lunghissimo (più di un secolo), innumerevoli personaggi, tanti ma non troppi e tratteggiati con attenzione e con toni emozionanti, il sogno americano, una bibita frizzante come frizzanti sono le vicende raccontate e la tecnica usata per raccontarle, una famiglia protagonista del proprio destino nel bene e nel male, un'America affascinante e matrigna. Tutto ciò contribuisce a rendere questo romanzo un'ottima lettura, appassionante e coinvolgente. Non fatevelo scappare.

Received as an ARC via my employer Barnes & Noble. Started 1-19-19. Finished 1-25-19. Excellent fictional story of a Southern family's rise and fall in the soda pop manufacturing business. Along the way, the reader learns American history of the era. One of the most fascinating list of characters I've ever read. The cover shows what appears to be a Coke bottle, but the story is not about the Coca-Cola Company, or maybe it is(?!). In any event, you won't soon forget these people. Some you want to cheer for, others you want to smack upside their heads!

The Great Southern American Novel.https://americanorum.wordpress.com/20...Curioso come American Pop di Snowden Wright, una saga familiare multigenerazionale, abbia un incipit molto simile a quello di un’altra saga familiare multigenerazionale, The Sport of Kings di C.E. Morgan. Lì Henry Forge, anello di congiunzione tra il passato e il futuro della famiglia Forge, scappa tra i filari di granoturco mentre la voce fuori campo di un narratore onnisciente lo ammonisce, “Quanto puoi correre lontano da tuo padre?” Per tutto il libro si tratterà di vedere quanto le costrizioni di ambiente e soprattutto della natura, possono costringere un percorso e compromettere il poco di libertà che ci è concessa. American Pop inizia con una domanda analoga: “How far would he go?” Si chiede Montgomery Forster, primogenito della terza generazione di Forster in America, figlio di Houghton Forster nato nell’anno del primo centenario degli Stati Uniti e fortunato inventore della Panola Cola, una fittizia bevanda gassata, ideale terza concorrente di Coca e Pepsi Cola. Se su The Sport of Kings non c’è storia, se non sotto forma di uno sfondo culturale molto sfumato su cui C. E. Morgan erige delle palafitte da cui nascono interessanti riflessioni scientifiche (questioni di razza e di genere vengono rielaborate con gli strumenti della biologia e della genetica e non sdraiate su oziose e ormai sterili considerazioni socio-politiche) su American Pop è invece proprio la storia la protagonista, intesa come produzione delle stesse radici culturali che ci permettono di crescere senza cadere, come le radici di un albero.La storia raccontata procede a singhiozzi e sussulti tra il 1876 e il 1976, con una coda che arriva fino alla metà degli anni ’80, saltando di anno in anno, avanti e indietro tra secoli e decenni, tra Mississipi, New York, Los Angeles, Parigi e il Sudamerica, e tra i vari personaggi che compongono la famiglia Forster, nessuno dei quali può dirsi protagonista più di altri. Due secoli di storia americana, dove la storia non è tanto la storia politica quanto la storia della cultura popolare. Una storia che accompagna qualunque cosa accada, che se ne sta sullo sfondo, pacifica, latente, come il fumo passivo o l’educazione cristiana in Italia. Che i due secoli della storia della familia Forster, ma di ogni storia di ogni famiglia o individuo, sia sempre accompagnata e coperta dalla cappa della tradizione storica e culturale è forse il miglior modo per mostrare come negli Stati Uniti, e soprattutto nel Sud degli Stati Uniti, quella storia sia un eterno presente, una vedetta in servizio permanente che regola e gestisce ogni altro evento, un codice genetico immateriale che definisce e fissa un’identità nazionale e culturale quasi impossibile da eludere. Così la saga dei Forster è preceduta da un albero genealogico che ne anticipa per certi versi il destino, istruendoci su chi nasce e chi muore e quando.American Pop sboccia nella culla d’America il delta del Mississipi, o “The Most Southern Place on Earth,” come viene chiamato in virtù della sua spiccata regionalità. È in quel rombo di terra racchiusa tra il Mississipi e lo Yazoo, tra Memphis e Vicksburg che nascono blues e jazz e è da lì che inizia la Grande Migrazione nelle città del nord ,Nel corso del libro si fa largo uso di fonti e studi ufficiali, come God Shakes Creation di David Lewis Cohn e Caste & Class in Southern Town di John Dollard, accanto altre fonti probabilmente inventate e spacciate per vere. Su queste radici profonde di una certa americanità, Snowden Wright incastona una più recente ramificazione dello “spirito americano” e si chiede cosa sarebbe successo se, per esempio, i Kennedy o i Ford fossero stati una famiglia del Mississipi e avessero costruito la loro fortuna inventando la Coca Cola, ossia la bevanda più squisitamente e simbolicamente americana, l’equivalente a stelle strisce della birra per la Germania, del vino per Italia o della vodka per la Russia.Houghton Forster, è il primo Forster americano, nato da genitori immigrati dall’Europa che in America avevano paradossalmente ritrovato quella stessa Europa dalla quale erano usciti: “Una volta raggiunta l’America, si sono trovati a viaggiare di nuovo per l’Europa, e a incontrare immigrati irlandesi nei loro soggiorni a New York, spagnoli quando hanno costeggiato la punta della Florida, francesi quando sono attraccati a New Orleans e tedeschi quando hanno passato il confine del Tennessee.” Siamo alle origini della formazione dell’identità americana che nasce per certi versi dai detriti della cultura europea, e l’America sembra quasi essere una versione imbastardita e pop del Vecchio Continente. All’aristocrazia europea, colta e borghese, si sovrappone una nuova classe media di arricchiti dall’intraprendenza capitalista, i nouveau riche, di cui i Forster diventano presto membri e ambasciatori. Alla cultura alta europea si sostituisce una cultura popolare, imbastardita, integrata e che nasce dal basso, lontana dall’elitarismo da cui per certi versi fiorisce. Come ha notato Carlo Freccero, “quel pensiero critico che l’Europa esprimeva con la filosofia, rinasce in America sotto forma di immaginario e narrazione. Da sempre il cinema, la letteratura, la fantascienza, hanno rappresentato per l’America un modo di esprimere il disagio di fronte a una realtà positiva che il mito della nuova frontiera aveva imposto come discutibile” (Carlo Freccero, Televisione, Bollati Boringhieri, 2013).Questo pop culturale trova forse la sua più sincera e diretta metafora nei soft-drink come la Coca Cola. Anche se il New England continuerà a chiamare soda quei soft-drink, nel Midwest continueranno a essere sempre chiamati emblematicamente pop. E è proprio il pop a farsi collante sociale e nazionale: quel pop culturale che Warhol rappresenta, parodia e mitizza nelle scatole di detersivo e di minestra, nelle Marilyn riprodotte in serie e soprattutto (appunto) nelle bottiglie della coca-cola che piace a tutti e che Warhol vede come minimo comune denominatore della “grandezza dell’America,” ossia della sua capacità di “essere la prima nazione in cui i più ricchi comprano le stesse cose dei più poveri. Guardi la tv, vedi la Coca-Cola e sai che il presidente beve Coca-Cola, Liz Taylor beve Coca-Cola e pensaci, anche tu puoi bere Coca-Cola. Una Coca-Cola è sempre una Coca-Cola e nessuna quantità di soldi potrà fartene avere una migliore di quella che sta bevendo il barbone all’angolo. Tutte le Coca-Cola sono uguali e tutte le Coca-Cola sono buone. Lo sa Liz Taylor, lo sa il presidente, lo sa il barbone e lo sai anche tu” (Andy Warhol, La filosofia di Andy Warhol: da A a B e viceversa, Feltrinelli, 2016).In Europa erano fioriti i frutti di secoli di arte, poesia, musica classica, cinema d’autore. L’America risponde con realtà popolari e alla portata di tutti: jazz, blues, rock, e poi musical, fumetti, televisione, romanzi di genere. Il prodotto tipico americano è il pop, e col pop si mostra quello che nella cultura più o meno alta si tende a nascondere sotto il tappeto: a un’America puritana, pulita e timorata di Dio (immagine squisitamente southern), fa da controcanto l’America licenziosa e lasciva di serie tv come Shameless, Easy, Transparent, Californication, Weeds o anche la recente Atlanta. Come la coca cola durante il proibizionismo mascherava tracce di pessimo alcol, allo stesso modo il nuovo folclore di un’America che costruisce un mito raccontando se stessa nasconde, edulcora e pettina una realtà che è spesso indesiderata e brutale. American Pop racconta la storia di una famiglia che è diventata dinastia e mito, ma che nasconde sotto il tappeto le proprie aberrazioni: perversioni sessuali, omosessuali, sesso saffico (con una meravigliosa versione finzionale di Josephine Baker), e ancora adulteri, corruzione, estorsioni, incesti e suicidi.Il libro non è certo privo di difetti—c’è un umorismo costantemente cercato ma non sempre raggiunto, lo stile è sfarzoso e brioso ma talvolta perde il suo calore cajun e si addormenta nella pretenziosità di un esibizionismo compiaciuto, i riferimenti storici, ricchi e precisi, come i riferimenti alla corruzione dei Southern Democrats, avrebbero giovato di una maggior coesione col resto—ma nessuno di quei difetti riesce a rovinare una storia che proietta problemi e caratteristiche del sud di ieri nell’America di oggi. Una storia che si annoda attorno oa quasi quattro generazioni di Forster, a partire dai fondatori che hanno trovato un’America che “garantiva ai suoi cittadini vita e libertà, ma che prometteva anche una felicità sempre fuori portata, una cosa da ricercare sempre,” a Houghton Forster primo Tycoon a cavallo tra due secoli a cavallo tra due millenni. E da lì ai suoi quattro figli: Monty, primogenito, ex-soldato durante la Prima Guerra Mondiale, politico segretamente gay, apertamente sepolcrale, perfetto segnaposto per la Lost Generation (e non a caso ricorda un po’ il Jake Barnes di The Sun Also Rises), Harold, che nonostante il suo autismo risulta essere il Forster più affidabile e maturo, e i “gemelli infernali,” Lance e Ramsey, che mostrano anacronisticamente le caratteristiche di baby boomers, come gli ultimi Forsters, Nicholas, Susannah e Imogene, presentano i tratti della Generazione X in anticipo.I Forsters sono un’altra delle famiglie letterarie, un incrocio tra i Tennembaum e i Darling di Dirty Sex Money. Ovviamente, come tutte le famiglie letterarie, una famiglia disfunzionale, ma si sa, ogni famiglia disfunzionale è disfunzionale a modo suo. Tutti insieme rappresentano quello che l’America dice di se stessa e tutti insieme nascondono quello che l’America allo stesso modo cerca inutilmente di nascondere di se stessa. Anche a se stessa.

American Pop by Snowden Wright is a highly recommended generational Southern family saga involving a cola dynasty.The Forster family was the founder of the world’s first major soft-drink company, the Panola Cola Company, and this is the story of their rise and fall across a century. Houghton Forster is the founder who developed a delicious fizzy drink with a secret ingredient that helped create a cola dynasty in Mississippi and propelled him and his family to the upper reaches of society as the demand for PanCola swept across the country. Houghton and his wife, Annabelle, have four children, Montgomery, Harold, and twins Ramsey and Lance.The chapters do not follow a chronological timeline, but jump from different periods in time. Two things are important to notice and use while reading: dates at the opening of chapters will set you in the right time period and the family tree at the beginning of the book will assist in identifying the characters until you know them more intimately. While all the characters may seem overwhelming at the beginning, if you stay with the novel the narrative will all start to make sense and fall into a timeline. It is rather essential to take it slow at first and learn who the characters are and where they fit into the family and the saga. Once you have a grip on who fits where and when, the narrative will move faster.Along the way the novel Wright utilizes the technique of adding real and imagined historical quotes and mythical reports, blending fact and fiction which adds a depth to the narrative and makes the novel feel more like a biographical piece on a real family soda dynasty. I liked this touch quite a bit. As you were learning some of the private inside information about the lives of the family, there is the added dimension of the historical public view of the Foresters. The result is an intricate family saga with a complex mythology.The quality of the writing is very good. The text is brimming with wit, irony, anecdotal digressions, and recognizably Southern sayings. At the same time there are also heartbreaking, tragic moments contrasting with incidences of great passion. Ultimately the characters are well-developed. At the end, you can almost believe that this Southern Gothic novel is a real biography of the first cola dynasty.Disclosure: My review copy was courtesy of HarperCollins.http://www.shetreadssoftly.com/2019/0...

I chose this book because it satisfied a prompt in the Pop Sugar Challenge. I thought it couldn’t be any worse than watching an episode of Dallas. I have never admitted that I secretly enjoyed Dallas, blaming family politics and one tv in the household for my viewership. With low expectations, I was happily surprised with an American Shakespearean Tragedy, told with satirical wit. I enjoyed the characters, with all their foibles, and dark painful secrets. For me, the back and forth of the story along the timeline, is rather genius. As the tragic circumstances of one storyline became painful to witness, the author moves us around along the timeline like the ball in a pinball machine, easing the pain and offering the reader relief, and a bit of hope before the inevitable moment comes and the ball drops out of play and the game is lost, although thoroughly enjoyed. This is a great summer beach read.

3.75 stars, rounded up because I love Southern Gothic.You can definitely tell the Faulkner inspiration, especially with the Compson family, and a lot of it worked beautifully. I too am a massive fan of the Compsons. The twist with Robert was great and I didn't see it coming. I spent so long trying to figure out how he would connect to the rest of the story and still didn't connect the dots. Unfortunately, comparing this book to Faulkner makes it clear how much this book falters. The characters - which should have shined in this type of book - didn't feel like they were fleshed out enough. A lot of the emotional punches never landed properly. I feel like this book tried to do too much in not enough time so there wasn't enough time for plots to fully work themselves out and for characters to grow. I also am not keen on how many problematic relationships were just brushed over.

I really wanted to love this book, about a fictional family whose patriarch founded a cola company. I love family sagas and the layout of the book was not linear, which kept things interesting. However, despite several strong story lines and a satisfying ending, I still felt like the threads hadn’t fully connected for me. Some family members I could have read an entire book about- Montgomery’s chapters in particular were gut wrenching. But others left me less than enthralled. However, I did end the last page wondering how a sequel would play out for the next generation, so that brought it to 4 stars for me.

Loved it. American 20th Century historical fiction is one of my favorite genres to read. I especially love stories with a pop culture element, so this book was right in my pocket. I loved the structure and was especially glad for the family tree at the top of the book. There were a lot of great characters, and I had no trouble keeping them straight. Succession, The Ice Cream Queen of Orchard Street, The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, the Coca-Cola store in Las Vegas, American Pickers and my grandfather’s drug store: this book reminded me of them all.

There’s nothing like a Southerner’s ability to spin yarns and epic tales with wry humor and an eye for detail. The Fosters are a fictional Southern dynasty who invented the world’s first major soft drink brand. But no dynasty would be complete without twists and turns, generational struggles and colorful characters. Chronicling the rise and fall of the Fosters through 19th and 20th century America, the book weaves a tale of society, wealth and culture from the gossipy salons of Mississippi to New York, Hollywood and Paris. Hello Hollywood? Someone needs to snap this baby up for a mini-series.

I’m not sure why this book does not have a higher rating, I thought it was excellent! Well written and interesting, if difficult to keep the characters & story line straight - since it is told in such a disjointed order. The only person whose story is straightforward is Robert’s and when he enters you’re like, “who the heck is this?“ Anyway, I got a kick out of it - anticipating how certain loose ends would be resolved , though in truth, some never were.