It's bold, powerful, dark and hard to believe that this is a debut novel. In alternating first person narratives from a cast of characters that will be hard to forget, Leah Weiss took me to the mountain community called Baines Creek in the Appalachian Mountains in NC. And I mean took me there! From the present day of the story in 1970 to flashbacks of the past and dreams, these various points of view give us a vivid picture of this place and the people who live there. From the beginning, the first narrative of Sadie Blue, which broke my heart from the first page, it feels like it will be her story. She's seventeen, pregnant and two weeks into her marriage to Roy Tupkin, after enduring brutal beatings, Sadie knows she has made a mistake. The grit and darkness don't just belong to Sadie, though. Her grandmother Gladys tells us of her awful past ridden with the drunkenness and senseless abuse.

There's much more to the story with characters you will love and those you will hate. Eli Perkins, the preacher whose daddy took him to "see the devil" when he was nine years old is a good man wanting to help the community by bringing in a teacher who might stay. Kate Shaw is the woman who comes to teach because she wants to help as well as get a fresh start. There's Birdie Rocas , wise with a touch of eerieness about her who you can't help but love. There are secrets of revenge, secrets of identity, hidden stills and hidden feelings of the women who outwardly keep in their expected place as victims of marital abuse. I loved the dialect, the descriptions in phrases I would never have known but yet so perfectly describe an image or a feeling - "a pinch of sad" , "a slice of selfish that won't pretty". And omg - the ending - I wasn't expecting that . 5 stars and recommended especially to those who love Southern Literature.

I received an advanced copy of this book from SOURCEBOOKS Landmark through NetGalley.

What a book! Really enjoyed! Highly recommend. Perfect book club pick!

It's not often I have a sense of how much I'm going to like or despise a book from a single, opening sentence, but I did with this one. The opening line pulled me in. I held my breath and sent out a small prayer that this book wouldn't lose steam before it wound its way to the ending.

It really didn't, although there were a couple areas that kept me from outright calling this 5-star fare. I'll get to those later.

First, the teaser description: I was led to believe that this book followed the life of Sadie Blue, a 17-year-old Appalachian teenager, newly pregnant and married (not in that order), and it does. Kind of. Told in first person present tense, this novel is more of a character study, and hops around chapter to chapter to various character perspectives. Surprisingly, it was well-written enough that I didn't mind the various changes of POV (although a small handful didn't seem especially distinct, particularly closer to the book's end), nor did the first person narrative get irritating. Instead, I found it an effective way to distinguish (most of) the various character voices and really offer a full picture of this rural environment via the eyes of both locals and the outsider Kate Shaw, a newly arrived grade school teacher.

At the core of this story is indeed Sadie, a product of her time and place. She's received no formal childhood education, can't even read more than a couple words, but she possesses a willingness to learn and better herself. When Kate Shaw comes along, she also has a resource from whom to learn and blossom. Unfortunately, Sadie finds herself in the unenviable, but sadly all too common, position of being her new husband's punching bag. Even with today's laws against domestic violence, this happens all too frequently. In 1970s Appalachia, it's almost standard. We see the residents in this fictional town of Baines Creek through the eyes of Sadie, her grandmother, a friend of the family, the town reverend, Kate Shaw, and even Sadie's abusive husband, among others. There's no overt mention of the time period (although I believe the teaser indicated the decade so I had some context before jumping into this), and it took me awhile to realize that sometimes when a new chapter began we backtracked in time and replayed it through another character's eyes, which was a little confusing (and part of the reason I think this doesn't quite hit the full 5-star rating). The ending was also somewhat predictable and a little abrupt. It could've been more fleshed out for a fuller emotional impact.

That said, the prose worked for me. I loved the descriptions, and alternating from rural vernacular to Kate Shaw's and the reverend's more comprehensible speech patterns kept the book from being too much of a drudge into tedious colloquialisms. It was fascinating to step into a time and place that had shades of a dystopian setting, even though it is very much a real location that stands outside of modern society's temporal confines. This story also fueled my online search for more articles and photos depicting Appalachia, and the characters stayed with me long after I finished the last chapter. That's all I can really ask for in a novel.

I sincerely hope Weiss publishes more stories (and that NetGalley is kind enough to provide me with their ARCs so I can lose myself in more of Weiss' lush prose).

WOW!!!! This is an amazing book! I couldn't put the book down once I picked it up. The book is set in the 1970s. It's the story of teen bride Sadie Blue. She's newly married to Roy Tupkin who repeatedly abuses her in just the 15 days of their marriage.

Sadie Blue soon realizes she should have listened to those who told her he was no good. She's stuck in her small town of Baines Creek, North Carolina and her only joy is listening to Loretta Lynn. When a stranger arrives and completely turns the town upside down, Sadie realizes there's more to life than being Roy's wife living in moonshine territory.

If the Creek Don't Rise is a powerfully written story of small town life.

This book, while could have been set at any time in history was set in the 1970s and tells the story of 17 year old Sadie Blue who finds herself pregnant and in an abusive relationship. But it is also a story of the strength of people who have so little and especially the bonds between the women who endure so much.

I had a lot of problems with this book. The main one being the portrayal of the south and the southerners. Every character was bitter and there was nothing but struggle. It is sad to see an author write such a stereo type. Overall I did not like this book.

I have been very fortunate to have good relationships in my life, so I can't relate, but I can't help but feel for Sadie Blue. This book does deal with some heavy themes; her life definitely isn't easy. It was an experience to "travel" to that time period, and read the interactions between people. I liked that the chapters were told from different character's points-of-view as well, and I liked their back stories & insight into their thoughts.

Thank you to NetGalley for my copy of this novel.

The fact that this book is written by a debut author is astounding to me. IF THE CREEK DON'T RISE is one of the best books I have read in a very long time, and I read A LOT, so this is a huge compliment.

Leah Weiss truly has a gift and I predict that this book will find itself on bestseller lists all over the United States and in Canada and it deserves to be there.

The way the small settlement is described makes it come alive for the reader, you can almost feel short of breath from the thin mountain air and feel the crunch of the leaves under your feet as you walk alongside the characters on the wooded paths.

The way each character is described makes the reader feel as if they know them. You will want to go search your closets to drop off extra clothes and blankets to drop off to some of the poorer families. In fact, you will start to think about all that you have, and just how lucky you are.

You will be inspired by the priest who tends to his small congregation and despite all proof that their lives will never change, he holds onto hope and onto the belief that things can and will get better. He is an inspiring character.

It is actually amazing just how wonderfully and thoroughly readers will come to care about the various people in the book, and not just one or two of them, you will come to care about the entire community.

In short, this book is freakin' fabulous. I rate it as 5 out of 5 stars but if it were possible to rate it higher, I would.

This is a MUST READ book that readers will not soon forget.

The story focuses on a handful of locals in the small mountain community of Baines Creek, Appalachia, North Carolina. It is a hash and hard life there. A poor community with a core of people who are willing to help those deserving of it.

Preacher Eli Perkins travels through the community swapping jokes and sharing food. He is the polar opposite of his spinster sister Prudence, who doesn’t seem to have a kind bone in her body. She is a bitter and resentful woman. Then there is Marris Jones, who is eternally good-hearted, charitable, helpful, understanding and willing to go out of her way to be understanding. The local healing woman Birdie Rocas, some are scared of her and think she is a witch. Probably something to do with Samuel the crow who hitches a ride in her hair, but she has a vast knowledge of plant, herbs and medicines as well as poisons. She keeps a journal of things that happen on the mountains, she is a keeper of folklore and natural wonders. The newly appointed teacher Kate Shaw, who on arrival learns more from the locals than she teaches. But as the mountain has accepted her, so do the people. But she has found a place where she feels she can settle and manages to find a place for herself.

Then there is the grumbling Gladys Hicks. She is the Grandmother of Sadie Blue. Gladys took Sadie in after her father had died, and left parentless. She thinks she is world wise but is very naive. Her world comes crashing down around her when her husband Roy Tupkin starts beating her after they have been married on ly fifteen days. Gladys know Roy is trouble, but Sadie will not listen to her.

This story is very well written, with some very unique characters and their histories. The way the people live, or I should say the way some people just exist gives a great depth to this story. It shows how poor and destitute family’s are, children with no shoes and wearing burlap sacks. If you think this is going to be a sad and depressing story, you will be wrong. It shows how people with a simple existence have a rich community spirit for those deserving of it. I know that would never feed them, but the goodwill and grace of others will.

It gets straight in at the beginning, with Sadie being beaten up by Roy, but that is just the hook, after that the story almost strolls along, but it still maintains its grip on the reader. I would definitely recommend this book to readers.

If The Creek Don't Rise takes place in a very small and remote Appalachian mountain community called Baines Creek in North Carolina. Taking place in the 1970's, many can't read, as education is fairly unheard of and severe poverty is considered normal among Baines Creek residents. We first meet Sadie Blue, who is 17, pregnant and newly married to her husband Roy Turpkin. She has only been married 15 days when she Roy starts hitting her and she knows she should her listened to her grandmother and other folks who told her to stay away from him. When someone new comes to town and gives everyone a new perspective, Sadie starts to believe there might be more to life then just being Roy's life.

This book is told from a variety of perspectives including Sadie Blue, her grandmother Gladys Hicks, Glady's next door neighbor Marris Jones, the local Pastor, Eli Perkins, as well as 6 other perspectives. I have only read one other book where I enjoyed this type of perspective, but it did work pretty well in this story. Although I wish I had been able to hear from Sadie's perspective a bit more. The language the book is written in is also fairly spot on to the Appalachia region where Baines Creek is located in the book. Anyone from or who has spent time there will instantly feel like they are listening to a neighbors conversation while reading this book. I haven't spent much time in the area, but it instantly brought back a lot of memories. The language might be difficult for some people to read, it did take me one chapter to adjust, but after that I really enjoyed it.

I really liked all of the characters in this book and because they live in such a small community, they are all so intertwined with each other. I love Glady and Marris and could easily see Glady sitting on her front porch in the evening watching the night roll in. All of the characters are well developed, even though we only hear from them each for one or two chapters. Although, again I would have enjoyed hearing a bit more from Sadie, otherwise it was a well written book with a pretty good ending. Thank you to the publisher for sending me an advanced reading copy of this book.

Thank you for giving me an opportunity to read this book. I struggled with the language and sentence structure of the book. I appreciated the in depth character development. In the end I felt that some characters that were introduced in the beginning had no follow up chapters and I wanted to read about how thing ended up for them (the teacher and the preacher). Overall, I felt the story was incomplete.

I received this novel via Advance Reader Copy (ARC) from Netgalley, in exchange for an honest review. Thank you to Netgalley.

This novel starts with the protagenist, Sadie Blue, talking to her dead father. Very young, naive Sadie's mother ran away shortly after she was born, leaving her with her weak father, who drank himself to death at an early age. Struggling with life and being forced to depend on her less than supportive, mean grandmother, Sadie is easy prey for local bad boy Roy Tupkin.

Falling pregnant, Sadie grasps at getting hitched, to become respectable in the eyes of the small town gossips. Poor Sadie has no idea what she's letting herself in for. Beaten by her husband, and deserted for days at a time, Sadie cannot depend on the local town, who turns a blind eye to her suffering. Scenes like this play out daily in remote Appalachia in 1970.

Into this bleak landscape, arrives Kate Shaw. Independent, strong-willed and very different to the townsfolk of Baines Creek, Kate has secrets of her own. The townsfolk are at once suspicious of and intrigued by her. So is the local preacher. Kate may just offer a way forward for Sadie. But will Sadie be strong enough to escape her pre-destined lot in life to make something of herself?

Woven into the story of Sadie Blue, the inhabitants of Baines Creek step forward and speak to the reader of their lives. I was transfixed reading the story. At first I wasn't sure of the year the story was set in. I was shocked to discover that the year is 1970. Reading this novel, I was simultaneously transfixed and immersed into both a different world and era. It is difficult to imagine living, let alone growing up in such a remote, desperate place, devoid of any hope, where beatings, incest and malnourishment are commonplace and where these traits can be handed down from generation to generation.

Stylistically, the novel was well written. The characters spoke in the local dialect, which I found hard to follow at first and made for a slightly slower read, but once I got used to the cadence of the speech, I found that this enhanced the story, rather than detracting from it.

Bravo!

Sadie Blue is 17 and pregnant by a man who thought loved her. She marries Ray and he starts physically abusing her immediately. The only support she has is her grandmother Gladys. Sadie needs to find the strength to leave Ray and realize she and her baby deserve so much more. This is a story told from many points of view, Sadie, Gladys, and various neighbors in the small town. It was a sad story but one filled with hope Thank you so to NetGalley and Sourcebooks Landmark for providing me an ARC for an honest review.

I am going to ramble in this review. So if that isn't your thing just go on past it...

Back when I was in the fourth grade we had an English teacher who dumped a box of books out one day and told us to read them and do book reports. I ate that up with a spoon and did my best to read them all. The thing is...I read one that I have never stopped thinking about. It was set in the Ozark mountains featuring what some people called a witch. It completely nailed the "mountain living" that I remembered my grandmother talking about. It was a big old chunk of a book, so only a couple of the kids including myself read it. I've never forgotten it and it's drove me nuts because I would love a copy of it. This book reminds me of that. And it's high praise.
It's going to be hard to top this book as my book of the year, if it even happens.

Authors have been trying to write the whole "hick-lit" thing in the last few years. I admit that it's my favorite genre that I think I've ever read. But this. This is freaking perfection.
The story centers around a very young, pregnant girl named Sadie Blue.
Her grandmother raises her after her mother takes off right after her birth and her daddy ends up drinking himself to death. (Her daddy is far from perfect) So I think Sadie latches on to the first thing she thinks is good in life. And that was in the form of Roy.

Roy beats the heck out of Sadie starting from what seems like the minute she marries him. But this is Appalachia in the 1970's. A husband does what he wants to with his wife and the small mountain town turns it's head.
There are women in these hills whose men beat them because they misconstrue Ephesians 5:22-23 as saying they can. They twist God's holy words: "Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands, as unto the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife.".

You would think this sounds like a typical hick lit story. You are so very, very wrong. Told from multiple viewpoints this story will stay with me forever. You have the preacher and his sanctimonious sister, the new teacher that has come to the mountains to start anew, Sadie herself, the local witch woman Birdie and even the hateful Roy and his sidekick since birth Billy.
This book is Appalachia as I knew it as a child. Don't read it and look down at anybody that lives or lived in this area. As a matter of fact, if that's your mindset just don't even bother picking this book up.
Outsiders see Appalachian poverty as something to be cut out. The good with the bad. They send volunteers to save you from yourselves....
"Do you know the saying, 'Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater?'
The teacher in her don't give me the time to say so, when she adds, 'Well, you write about the baby while everyone else is writing about the bathwater.'

Exactly.

This book was the exact measure of perfection in my eyes. I'm thankful that I was able to read it. Appalachia may have changed a bit since the story was set, but this book is it's heart.

Booksource: Netgalley in exchange for review.
PS I used my favorite photographer of all times images in this review. Sally Mann's photos also do what this book does. (Portrays Appalachia in a light that might make you a bit uncomfortable but you will never forget it.)

What marvelously poignant storytelling. 1970's Appalachia is what most would call a 'god forsaken' place; a dot on the map. But, to the people that have settled there for generations it's home and carries its own rules for survival. "This protracted scene in primitive Appalachia—in the throes of another angry storm that refuses to end, when political assassinations and civil rights battles and the birth control pill change tomorrows down below—is timeless and tiring." This is a bitter sweet story of finding hope when there is little light.

When I began the book, I knew it was set near my home. However, I didn't pay attention to the decade. I would have sworn for the first half of the book it was set during the Great Depression. Then I remembered where it was set and let the shock of 1970 settle in. I loved reading this book. It changes point of view quite frequently, but if you pay attention, it does not ruin the continuity of the story. I loved all the characters you were supposed to love, but I think I either loved Birdie or Miss Shaw the most. Every mountain community needs a Birdie and a Miss Shaw. I had no problem with the dialect, but it helps when you grow up with it. It was a good testament to the poverty, yet self-sufficient existence of Appalachia. It was fairly real, despite some of the far-fetched behaviors of some characters.

This review is going to be a bit gushing because I was completely blown away by this book – I absolutely loved it. I’m split between finding it hard to believe that this is Leah Weiss’s first novel and shouting, Leah, why did you wait so long? Did I mention that I adored this book?

There are a number of different narrative voices but they are each distinctive and convincing in terms of characterisation and tone.

The central character in the story is Sadie Blue. The reader is immediately drawn to her – not much more than a child herself, pregnant and saddled with a no-good husband who beats her up for the slightest reason:
‘Fifteen days has gone by since that piece of paper got signed. Roy beats on me pretty regular cause nobody stops him. I thought we got married for a mighty reason. I thought I was special to him. I musta made it all up, cause none of it’s true.’

Despite all she suffers, Sadie’s resilience is incredible as she looks for a way out - any way out - of the situation she finds herself in. Channelling the voice of her dead father and her singing idol, Loretta Lynn, she finds the strength to do this.

Sadie is just one of the incredible female characters the author has created. There’s Gladys, who also endured marriage to an abusive husband until his death in an accident, and finds herself alone and every day a struggle but still carries on because she knows no other way.

‘Life’s too shitty. For a old woman, it’s more shit that I can shovel. I can’t remember if I ever had a choice but to put one front of the other and walk the line on a rocky road to nowhere.’

Gladys has secrets that she thinks nobody knows but her friend, Marris, knows different. Marris, a widow, is a lovely warm character who looks out for the less fortunate in Baines Creek.

In case you’re thinking all the male characters are bad and the female characters good, the author redresses the balance with Eli Perkins, the preacher, and Prudence, his sister. Eli feels an immediate affinity with the new schoolteacher, Kate Shaw, an older woman who left her previous position under a cloud but whose passion for teaching shines through.

‘Kate is a magician, a pied piper who has absconded with our children’s hearts. Mine too.’

Eli recognises in her a kindred spirit, someone who is prepared to fight against the low expectations of the townspeople for their children, who can be ‘an ally to instil hope and possibility in my good people’. However, as an outsider and single, independent woman, Kate attracts the malicious attention of Prudence, made resentful by her harsh upbringing in a familyof several generations of preachers.

‘Everything I did was coated with the Lord’s slippery words. I almost drowned in verse. I learned to breathe underwater was what I did, being the daughter of an Eli.’

The close of the novel sees Sadie Blue’s story return to centre stage as she draws on all her strength of will to bring about a change in her situation.

This book will stay with me for a long time – even more so because of that devastating final line. I’m not sure my review can do justice to this book but I’ll just say that if you love southern fiction, superlative writing, a compelling storyline and wonderful characterisation, please search out If the Creek Don’t Rise. I just hope Leah Weiss doesn’t wait as long to publish her next book.

This book claims to be about Sadie Blue, a poverty stricken country girl from Appalachia North Carolina. This story is not about Sadie Blue. It begins with her and ends with her, but the bulk of the book is taken up by the teacher, Kate Shaw, and her struggles to fit into this town. I'm not saying the story was bad. It wasn't. It actually got better the farther into the book I got. It just wasn't about Sadie Blue.

This book deals with poverty in Appalachia in the 1970's. Kate Shaw comes to this mountain town to teach, and discovers a whole new world. The town is stuck in time, with no real advancements, and they even have their own "language" a southern dialect so foreign to me that I found myself having to Google some of the words. I live in the Kentucky Appalachia, for crying out loud and I still had a hard time reading the dialect. This lead me on a research kick that last for several hours. Reading about the poverty so close to my home that I was completely unaware of. It still exists today, just a few county's over from my own. I was baffled. I simply couldn't wrap my head around how a town could get so stuck in time. Upon researching, I learned that I had heard some of this Appalachian dialect before, from my own family growing up. Some of it was still new to me, however. I did not know that a "cathead" means a large biscuit or that a "poke" is a bag.

This book is from the view point of several different characters, each having a turn at their part of the story. I particularly liked the chapter about Prudence, though she was the most deplorable character in the book. It's insightful and it seems outdated, but it's not, apparently. I would recommend this book to anyone that was interested in the Appalachian lifestyle. However, you should know that towns like this are very isolated and while it's not a common occurrence, it does happen. Towns like this still exist today, and this book opened my eyes to that.

I feel beyond lucky to have received this ARC by Sourcebooks Landmark in exchange for an honest review.

This is a book I truly want everyone to read. It is an ODE to women, the strength of women, the suffering of women and how they are much more affected by the lack of education than men are.
It is brilliantly written by a woman. The story is reminiscent of ‘The Glass Castle’, ‘Crooked letter, Crooked letter” or “Same kind of different as
me”.
Set up in rural North Carolina in the 70’s , Sadie Blue is pregnant, marry too young because she wants to be ‘legal’ and quickly gets knocked around by her new husband: bad boy Roy Tupkin.

Contrary to traditional story telling, the author is using all the character around young Sadie Blue to tell us about her, to lead us through sadie’s story. On the journey we learn about Sadie’s grand mother Gladys who raised her, about her aunt Mary Harris Jones, about Priest Eli Perkins and his sister Prudence, about the new teacher in town Miss Kate Shaw, about Roy and his sidekick Billy Barnhill and about the mystical Birdie and her crow.
In the small Appalachian village of Baines Creek everyone is connected to each other and plays a pivotal role, though a chain of events, into Sadie’s Blue unforgettable story.

This is Leah Weiss’ debut novel, which is really hard to believe.The whole story is masterfully crafted until the last sentence.
A well deserved 5 stars which I very rarely give out !