Alli Dyer's STRANGE FOLK

Thanks to partners NetGalley and Atria Books for the digital ARC of Alli Dyer’s Strange Folk. The book will be published on August 6! 

Alli Dyer’s Strange Folk is a story of generations of women in Appalachia and is—in the synopsis—compared to the works of “Alice Hoffman, Deborah Harkness, and Sarah Addison Allen.” Yes, please.

The novel centers on Opaline, now called Lee, who left her home and family in Craw Valley for college and never came back. Now, with her marriage disintegrating, Lee and her children have returned to her grandmother Belva’s home to find that not much has changed. Belva is still the community healer, magic worker, and occasional outcast; Lee’s mother Redbud is still an addict; and Lee still yearns to be elsewhere, promising herself that they won’t stay long.

Lee has never told her kids, Meredith and Cliff, anything about her home, so she’s surprised to find that they’re enchanted by the natural beauty, Belva’s mysterious knowledge, and a deep history that draws them in.

Then the deaths start. There’s suspicion of Belva and a vague sense of threat permeates everything around Lee’s family. Lee is reminded of why she left and what she was running from. She’s drawn into considering just why the deaths have happened just as she’s rediscovering the entirety of who she was and who she wants to be.

Strange Folk is such a compelling novel, one both firmly rooted in the realities of its rural community setting and in the magic that’s woven through each page. I appreciated the way Dyer makes apparent both the attraction that Craw Valley holds and the reasons that Lee might have felt the need to experience something different in her youth. The author illuminates the problems epitomized by Lee’s family—addiction and poverty and prejudice—without discounting the very real beauty of a tight-knit community, rich traditions, and natural beauty. Dyer weaves together Lee’s coming home with a suspenseful plot beautifully.

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