The Woods of Fannin County by Janisse Ray

The Woods of Fannin County Reviews

• 
  Dave Marsland

  ''Why do they want to put us off up here? Bobby said.
  God works in mysterious ways, Hiram said
  What does that mean?
  Git along the best you can, I guess.’’
  
  Based on a true story, The Woods of Fannin County is a gripping tale that’s difficult to fathom. In 1945, eight children (the eldest being 10 at the time) were taken on a wagon to a remote shack in the Blue Ridge foothills of Fannin County, and left to fend for themselves. Their mother just left them there. Occasionally she would return to check on them and bring them food and clothes, but there was no pattern to this. Often she bullied the children when she returned to the shack. What’s worse is that her parents encouraged her to do it, and the community chose to turn a blind eye. It’s heartbreaking.
  What unfurls is an extraordinary tale of survival and kinship amongst the siblings. They forage for food, learn how to light fires, they learn to steal. They were left in the shack for 4 years until they were rescued.
  The truly remarkable thing is that they all survived and went on live fairly 'normal' lives afterwards.
  Janisse Ray heard about their story from her father, then spend 10 years researching and speaking to the surviving children, before writing (and self publishing) the book.
  Beautifully written with sparse dialogue, it takes on some tough themes. It's a difficult story to tell, but it's an important one that will stay with you for a very, very long time.
• 
  Charlene

  Janisse Ray is one of my favorite nonfiction/nature authors. But even so, I hesitated about reading this book, her first fictional work. It is very closely based on a true story and a difficult one to read about.
  
  In the 1940s, 8 young children, ranging in ages from a year to 11 years old, were taken by their mother and grandfather up to a nearby mountain shack and semi-abandoned for 3 years. At first the mother would return weekly with food but as time went on her visits got more infrequent and she grew very abusive to the children, particularly to the daughter whose looks reminded her of the husband who had left her. Ruby, it seems, was in an ongoing affair with the county sheriff and didn't want the children and neither did the grandparents. The story is outlined in the preface with Janisse Ray talking about how it came to written so no spoilers here.
  
  It is both a story of the children's survival (cooking hominy on an open fire, gathering firewood, finding ramps, poke sallet, berries, apples, etc.) and their struggles with guilt and shame over not being wanted and what happened during those three years. As adults, the siblings buried the memories of their time in the mountains and only as they were aging did they begin to talk about it among themselves and eventually want the story told. It isn't just a story of the failure of parents and family but also of community -- local people knew these children were alone on the mountain but the tradition of not interfering in "family business" was very strong then.
  
  I finished this book several days ago but I am still thinking about it. I marvel, too, that the siblings all did survive and led productive lives, with families of their own, without turning to alcohol or abuse themselves.
  
  It's not a long book and it is told in almost a documentary style, half way between fiction and recording of fact. I miss the lyrical quality of Janisse Ray's nature writing in this but it is an important story and I think she found the best way to share it through fiction.
• 
  Angela

  I really liked this story which reached my heart. I am very close to many people who have shuffled through foster homes and yes that small hard rock like a hickory nut in their gut and soul always remains. Stories like these of Appalachia and or foster families must be captured. Thank you Janisse Ray for courageously stepping out of your eco-mode to write some fiction. Super clean content and inspiring for self-publishers too.
• 
  Irma

  A true story that needed to be told. Thanks Janisse.
• 
  Craig Amason

  This is a self-published novel by a highly-acclaimed author. That doesn't happen every day. But Janisse Ray has expressed in interviews her frustration with the current book publishing market. She has nothing to lose, really, by publishing her own book. I was attracted to this title because I have read Ray's work, including Ecology of a Cracker Childhood. She is a fine writer. I also was interested in this book because I am very familiar with Fannin County, Georgia, where my family had a vacation home for about fifty years.
  
  This is a heartbreaking story, especially considering that it is based on the lives of real children and their hardships due to abandonment by their mother and father and extended family. Left to fend for themselves at such a young age, it is almost unbelievable that this could have happened in the 20th century and in an area of the country that is not exactly sparsely populated.
  
  There is nothing wrong with the writing whatsoever, with the possibility that there isn't enough of it for a story of such magnitude. Ray should have either decided to stick to a limited set of facts and write an article about these children (perhaps she tried but couldn't find a publisher?), or she should have settled in and wrote a novel that filled in way too many of the existing gaps of time, character development, and plot, which would have made this a much better book.
• 
  Renea Winchester

  Fans of Janisse Ray, having read her stellar works of nonfiction, have begged for this transition to fiction. We know she has a magical way of sprinkling readers with stardust and luring us into her wooded-world where she then opens our eyes to the truth. In this debut novel, Janisse once again takes us to the woods she loves, painting vivid pictures of remarkable children who survived an unimaginable ordeal. We are with them at every turn of this novel.
  This novel will grab you by your heart and refuse to let go. In this testament of love beyond compare our eyes are open to childhood trauma and the lengths one travels to survive.
  Well done!
• 
  Angela Martin

  Pitch perfect, zero fat economy in this naturalist treatment of a occurrence wrought by humans on members, the young, of their own species of southern Appalachia. Ray is a genius at every genre or discipline to which she turns her deft hand.
• 
  Erika O'Brien

  Impossible to put down and at the same time difficult to digest as the book is based on a true story. It was hard to read as a mother, but there was so much beauty in the writing.
  
  Ray is able to transform tragedy into poetry and ugliness into beauty.
• 
  Rachel

  Short, I was able to finish it in a day. But very intriguing and sad. Will look at the other books by the author.
• 
  Phil

  An emotional, revelatory telling of a true story that serves as a harsh reminder of the extremes of the human experience. The disgust I feel toward the heinous Ruby, Roy, Mr. Allen, America, and the community that abandoned the Woods children to fend for themselves in a ramshackle mountainside shanty, is countered by the fierce love and commitment Bobby, Glenda, and Phyl have for each other and their siblings. The only thing more amazing than their story is the fact that they survived to share it.
• 
  Sara

  What a heart-breaking story, told through interspersed sections of fictionalized remembrances and the near-transcripts of present-day interviews with at least one of the grown children. For all the romanticizing of the olden days being a better time when large, extended families supported themselves and each other, the fact is the lives of children who are the product of difficult circumstances have often been under-valued, through no fault of their own.
  
  I hope Janisse Ray writes more fiction. As much as I love her non-fiction writing, this glimpse into her expanded skill as a story-teller was most welcome.
• 
  Rachel West

  A fictional retelling of a true story. Heartbreaking and frustrating and an incredible story of survival.
• 
  Midge

  Based on a true story. 8 kids abandoned by all relatives and forced to tend for themselves in North Georgia mountains..
  Good but sad.
• 
  Becca

  Very well written book! So sad and disturbing, but I'm glad the story was told.
• 
  Steve Procko

  A stunning tale of survival.
  
  A remarkable fact-based story of children abandoned and left to their own devices in the rugged North Georgia mountains in the 1940s. When the adults in their lives fail them, their family bond keeps them all alive. An excellent read.
• 
  Bill

  Knowing that this was based on a true story made it a difficult read. Hard to imagine children, babies even, left to forage on their own.
• 
  Katy Manley

  Once again, Janisse Ray blends her knowledge of and love for nature with an emotional, raw, reflective experience that you'll forget is fiction. This is a painfully beautiful read about the human condition. And while not at all political, this novel has been published in a time when we can all use a reminder to pay attention, be compassionate, and love our neighbors.
  
  Also of note, I love the font choice, font size, and page feel of the physical book itself.
• 
  Chelsey Hillyer

  Ray brings her brilliant gift of writing the natural world in vivid color to the landscape of the human heart. Even as she offers the reader a story almost too painful to imagine (and true, to boot), Ray gives voice to beauty in the midst of suffering.
• 
  Donna Everhart

  I'm not even sure where to begin.
  
  First, the only thing beautiful about this story is the artwork on the cover, done by the author's husband, and the writing itself. But, that's where the beauty stops and ugliness begins.
  
  This story is rather mind-blowing. After reading this, what is apparent is human nature can be the most evil, vile thing on this planet, and it's even more despicable when it's about a mother who turns against her young for her own selfish reasons.
  
  This is based on true events about how the Woods children, all eight of them, ranging in age from 10 years old down to a three month old baby, were abandoned by their mother. She takes them up into a mountainous wilderness at the Georgia/North Carolina line, and with only a decrepit shack for shelter, and very little food, she leaves them. It's a surprising story, and even more surprising is it happened in 1945, and people knew about the kids, but many did nothing.
  
  For all of the harshness of what they endured through the four years they lived in worse than squalid conditions, I guess you could say there was additional beauty in the fact that this account shows such a strong bond between brothers and sisters, along with the fortitude of those who had nothing, but through sheer determination, overcame the odds. The story is remarkable. Highly recommend.
  
• 
  Vickie McEntire

  Some preparation may be required to read this book. Tell your significant other that you may be emotional when you close the book. Pick a day you can give to this story, because once you open it to begin reading you won’t close it until the last page is devoured. Janisse Ray is a captivating and thought-provoking storyteller, a painter of words, a magician. Her words will absorb your attention while she unveils a picture you can’t turn away from. Then she will transport you to the very place she paints, and you will stare, unable to run or even move, at the horrors this family of children endured. In “The Woods of Fannin County,” Ray’s ability to evoke empathy with her lyrical and descriptive writing style shines. She treats the legacy of this broken family with the tenderness of a gloved gallery technician. The children were abandoned by their mother, father, and grandparents. They foraged for food, but the one thing they would never find in the forests of Fannin County is love. This story goes beyond the poverty of Appalachia. Ray shows us the depths of apathy in a social environment and the miracle of survival and resilience of the human spirit under such conditions. Ray has cultivated a voice for the unheard, and lets it sing a sad song uninhibited.
• 
  Melinda

  This is Janisse Ray's first novel, but it's one based on true events. In 1943 in North Georgia, eight children are taken to a shack far out into the woods and left there to fend for themselves. This is definitely a haunting story; there are things I will take away and harbor, thinking about those kids. The writing is gorgeous. Ray knows the woods, the plants, trees, and flowers, and the natural world provides for these children -- that and what little else they can scavenge, steal, and buy on their grandfather's stingy credit at the backwoods store. This book made me cry as grown up Bobby comes to terms with what happened and the way its shaped him and his "family" of brothers and sisters, the only family they had. This story makes me angry at all the people in the community -- at least a handful -- who knew about the children and did nothing. After reading the novel, I drove the backroads of Fannin County where large homes sit a good stone's throw from places where people struggle to live. This is the tail end of Appalachia, as Ray reminds us, and away from the tourists and gentry, there is much rural poverty. I challenge you to read this book and be unchanged.