House All Stilled: A Novel

By A.G. Harmon

In a small town in Mississippi, a young boy is coming to maturity in spite of himself. Henry Tollet arrives home one day badly bloodied after being attacked without provocation near his school bus stop. He did not even know the boy who did it, a scraggly youth who vanished as mysteriously as he had appeared. Henry winces as his grandfather tends to the wound, but it is his father's reaction that troubles him.

Cox Tollet received custody of his son after Henry's mother divorced him, and he now tries to hold onto his father's farm--without any help from the old man, who still holds the title but spends most of his time drinking. Henry, now twelve, has been an increasing source of concern and dismay for Cox. Called to task for not defending himself against his assailant, Henry is expected to seek out the stranger and take revenge.

Henry's inner struggle over satisfying his father propels this haunting, sexually charged novel, which leads us through a tangle of strained relations and misdirected intentions. The mystery of the assailant's identity and motives creates tension both in the house and with Henry's headstrong mother and stirs up old heartaches and recriminations based on memories that may or may not be true.

A. G. Harmon's portrait of three generations pitted against one another depicts a family deadlock from shifting perspectives. Henry has known for a long time that he did not exactly suit his father; now Cox's expectations have stoked a fresh anger in his heart. When not distracted by his son's diffidence, Cox is faced with sorting through his own father's lies. Old Man Tollet, meanwhile, rambles on about his wartime experiences or absently sings "sacred harp" songs from his youth.

Cox's dissatisfactions with both his father and his son--and theirs with him--move the story to a gripping resolution, one in which Henry learns not only to fend for himself but to fend for his future. A House All Stilled brings readers face to face with three uncertain lives and shows that certainty belongs only to those who have the courage to claim it.

The Author: A. G. Harmon was born in Houston, Mississippi, and grew up there and on his family's farm in Columbia, Tennessee. A two-time nominee for the Pushcart Prize, he was the 1994 recipient of the Milton Center Fellowship for the Novel and has also received a Thomas Williams Short Story Award. He presently teaches at the Catholic University of America.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1572332026
• ISBN13: 9781572332027
• Release Date: October 2002
• Publisher: Univ Tennessee Press
• Length: 248 Pages
• Weight: 1.15 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.0" x 0.8" x 6.0"

Customer Reviews

Already a Master

There is not one phrase, one sentence, one paragraph here that is not crafted with the precision and grace. Harmon draws the boy Henry in such depth that we are bonded to him after the first few pages. A sense of dread then comes. We are after all attached to Henry.His changes worry us, delight us, then make us wish for him. The first thing I did when I finished this book was to find out if Harmon has written anything else. No...but I'm waiting and watching for it.

Reality embodied in fiction. Harmon delivers.

Harom walks along a foreboding tightrope using a long balancing stick of reality. This is not a feel-good book... it's one that grasps the reader from page one and challenges you to continue the walk across the string. Along the way, you will find no saving graces, but ways not to fall down... ways to cope by turning the page. You won't find policially correct nonsense in this work... you'll find real emotions and real ways the characters deal with them. You'll find yourself in more than one place in more than one character. There are no heros... just people living the best they can with the circumstances they got. Harmon is a storyteller and not a psychologist. Thank God. Here's a story that makes us interested and want to think. It's refreshing that he doesn't give any answers or excuses... he just tells about how people live and relate in this story. The details of coming-of-age in a boy's life amidst difficult circumstances is not a new phenominom... here we just get it told in a real way. Definitly worth reading... it won't take long, either. Once you get started, you won't want to put the book down. Harmon has proven to be a modern master storyteller. Let's hope for more from this writer.

Haunting story, elegantly told

At times the images are wrenching, but always a page turner. Harmon paints a vivid picture of a young boy coming of age in the rural South. Laced with tender and funny moments, Henry is caught in a battle between his mother's aspirations and his father's history, all the while struggling with his own changing body. Not your typical piece of regional fiction, A House All Stilled is timeless, poignant and elegantly written.

A House All Stilled

Here is a novel that introduces us to three generations of men all seeking to find approval and understanding. The young boy wants his fathers approval but the pressure put upon him make it difficult. He is forced to reach maturity at an early age.This is not always pretty but it has its uplifting moments. The book is a page turner, and I know we have a promising new writer on the scene.

Not to Be Missed

This is a new literary voice that will most certainly not go unnoticed. A House All Stilled is a fast-paced, suspenseful,at times hauntingly lyrical novel set in rural Mississippi. A divorced father finds himself between unresolved conflicts with his father, now lost in alcohol and old sacred harp music, and his moody and vulnerable son, on the cusp of adolescence. The three men share a house and a tangled web of lies and manipulations, brutality and tenderness--in unlikely communion with each other. From the outside comes a mysterious assault, an ambitious mother's suspicions, and the threat of a family coming apart. A reader fed up by the psychologically simplistic endings of many recent novels will not be disappointed by this novel's resolution.