num_pages: 309
description: The publication of Dorothy Allison's Bastard Out of Carolina was a landmark event. The novel's profound portrait of family dynamics in the rural South won the author a National Book Award nomination and launched her into the literary spotlight. Critics have likened Allison to William Faulkner, Flannery O'Connor, and Harper Lee, naming her the first writer of her generation to dramatize the lives and language of poor whites in the South. Since its appearance, the novel has inspired an award-winning film and has been banned from libraries and classrooms, championed by fans, and defended by critics.Greenville County, South Carolina, is a wild, lush place that is home to the Boatwright family - a tight-knit clan of rough-hewn, hard- drinking men who shoot up each other's trucks, and indomitable women who get married young and age too quickly. At the heart of this story is Ruth Anne Boatwright, known simply as Bone, a bastard child who observes the world around her with a mercilessly keen perspective. When her stepfather, Daddy Glen, "cold as death, mean as a snake", becomes increasingly more vicious toward her, Bone finds herself caught in a family triangle that tests the loyalty of her mother, Anney - and leads to a final, harrowing encounter from which there can be no turning back.
language: English
title: Bastard Out of Carolina
titlecomplete: Bastard Out of Carolina
genres: Fiction, Coming Of Age, Queer, LGBT, Literature, Classics, Novels, Contemporary, Southern, Literary Fiction
ratings_count: 43714
places: Greenville, South Carolina, South Carolina
awards: awardedAt: 725875200000
name: Ferro-Grumley Award
category: Lesbian Fiction, awardedAt: 694252800000
name: National Book Award Finalist
category: Fiction
publisher: Flamingo