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The School of Beauty and Charm

Contributors

By Melanie Sumner

Formats and Prices

Price

$11.99

Format

ebook (Digital original)

Format:

ebook (Digital original) $11.99

This item is a preorder. Your payment method will be charged immediately, and the product is expected to ship on or around September 28, 2001. This date is subject to change due to shipping delays beyond our control.

This is the story of the Peppers family of Counterpoint, Georgia. Henry and Florida Peppers are pertinacious Baptist parents whose dearest wishes are to keep their asthmatic son Roderick alive and their smart-ass daughter Louise from going to hell. Louise, the little hellion, tells the story.

And what a story it is, about how ponderous Henry, hysterical Florida, and hell-bent-for-rebellion Louise, awash in grief after Roderick’s death at fifteen, go on living. Steady-at-the-helm, Henry buries himself in his work managing Southern Board, the local cardboard factory. Flamboyant Florida, with a fine-honed knack for losing her cool, redecorates their custom-built house, the Aerie, and takes up painting by numbers. Louise indulges her addictions: at nine, she discovers vanilla extract. After Roderick dies, she adds liquor, food, sex (at sixteen, she seduces a Southern Board laborer), and out-and-out danger, finally, at eighteen running off to join the circus (a carnival, actually). Louise gets to be the clown.

THE SCHOOL OF BEAUTY AND CHARM is a daring novel that walks a fine line between high comedy and real tragedy. But at heart, it is a moving portrait of a father and mother, two good-hearted people doing everything wrong to win back their daughter.

On Sale
Sep 28, 2001
Page Count
320 pages
Publisher
Algonquin Books
ISBN-13
9781616202316

Melanie Sumner

About the Author

Melanie Sumner is the author of The School of Beauty and Charm, a novel, and Polite Society, stories. A graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, she earned her MFA from Boston University and was the recipient of a Whiting award in fiction in 1995. She currently lives in Rome, Georgia, and teaches creative writing at Kennesaw State University.

Learn more about this author