DAWN MAJOR’S, THE BYSTANDERS, Finalist for 2024 Georgia Author of the Year-Best First Novel
The Bystanders pays homage to Americana, its small-town eccentricities, and the rural people of the Northern Mississippi Delta region of Southeast Missouri—a territory sold in the Louisiana Purchase where centuries later people still speak Paw Paw French and honor Old World traditions.
The Bystanders is a dark yet humorous coming-of-age story set in the 1980s when big hair was big and MTV ruled the airwaves. Shannon Lamb’s “Like a Virgin” and attitude and fashion choices, her fortune-teller mother, Wendy Samples, and her no-good, cheating, jobless stepfather, Dale Samples, result in Shannon finding few fans in the real town of Lawrencetown, MO. In a quiet town of annual picnics and beautiful landscapes, the Samples’ rundown trailer and odd behaviors aren’t charming the locals. If small towns are big families, then the Samples quickly discover that they are the black sheep of the family. Only townie, Eddy Bauman, is smitten by Shannon and her Valley Girl ways. For Wendy and Dale, the move from Los Angeles is a do-over in the countryside, but Shannon feels as if she has landed on Mars.
Will Wendy and Shannon remain bystanders in their own nightmare?
Or will Shannon and Wendy learn to rely upon themselves to claw their way out of poverty, abuse, and especially Dale?
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The Bystanders
SEEKING A DO-OVER IN A SMALL TOWN, A DYSFUNCTIONAL FAMILY DISCOVER THEY HAVE PACKED UP THEIR PERSONAL DEMONS AND THAT THE LOCALS AREN’T SO WELCOMING.
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