Sunday People - by Jo Ann Kiser (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

Orson Caskill-patriarch, storekeeper, philosopher, and lover of life (particularly as it is lived in Osier County, Kentucky)-is dying. Gathered to celebrate a family wedding, five people whose lives he has touched as a husband, father, lover, and friend join Orson, reflecting not only on him but also on their own lives. In a postlude, Orson's granddaughter works at fashioning a life enriched by her legacy.

Although these "Sunday people" range from Orson to an outlaw and rebel to a professor at a prestigious university in Chicago, they all share a lifelong allegiance to eastern Kentucky's coal-mining towns, rural villages, and beautiful, endangered countryside.

This intense novel's seven characters seek meaning as it can be discovered through landscape and history, with each exploring their reality in a chapter of his or her own.

"Sunday People is a novel about living and dying. It opens from the first-person viewpoint of Orson Caskill, store owner, philosopher, and family patriarch, whose memories and intentions drive a story of family choices and consequences. From its opening lines, Sunday People embraces a special form of reflective reasoning, allowing its readers to enter Orson's life. . . . Readers will appreciate the thoroughly compelling "you are here" focus that brings to life the events shaking Osier County, Kentucky as well as the family's legacy. Readers interested in the experience of Kentucky's coal-mining towns and heritage will especially appreciate how Kiser builds her story around history. . . . Sunday People's passages about Kentucky's evolving culture create a hard-hitting, reflective work that should not be missed." - D. Donovan, Senior Reviewer, Midwest Book Review

"Orson Caskill is 68 years old and dying of cancer. Born and raised in Kentucky,, Orson is now taking stock of his life while at a family wedding. Similarly reflecting on past choices are gathered friends and family members whose respective life paths have all crossed in one way or another. . . . Orson . . . prefers to spend his Sundays at a little cabin overlooking what he refers to as "God's pond." His mortality forces him to consider the choices he made in youth; regarding his family, he "want[s] them to know the truth about [him], whatever that means." ... An emotional read with lyrical prose." - Kirkus Reviews

"Sunday People is a deeply intimate portrait of family and generational ties. Kiser does not shy away from tough subjects, instead inundating the work with hard realities and philosophical questions that are difficult to contend with. It is the type of novel that begs further examination and one that would be a joy to re-read for its sharp language, symbols, and structure." -Haley Perry, Independent Book Review

"Kiser is an eastern Kentucky native, spending her early days there. The region left an imprint on her. . . . [Sunday People] is the story of Orson Caskill and the people close to him. The author mines her own experiences and memories to weave her tales. . . . One by one our narrators pass along Kiser's story baton. She excavates enduring characters, embroidering their stories with delicacy and emotion." -Vick Mickunas, Book Nook, Dayton Daily News

"In Sunday People. . . Osierville residents gather for a wedding. . . . The event launches seven eponymous chapters whose accounts' whole surpasses their singular sum. . . . On Sarvis Mountain, as everywhere, stories tightly bound together remain each teller's own. Eastern Kentucky's parochial and progressive characters honor and defy stereotype, living interesting, human lives." - Jane Blakelock, Yellow Springs News