I loved this years and years ago. Now I wonder how it holds up, since Southern-themed books are pretty suspect to me these days. Still, it was some wonderful writing. ( )

This collection of tales from rural Depression-era Georgia is a thinly veiled autobiography and part of a series. The author's writing style is a little odd, but somehow well suited to its purpose.

I read Run With the Horses because my mother loves Ferrol Sams books above nearly all others. She always said the south he describes is like the one she remembers. I was puzzled by that, since she grew up just outside Birmingham, and "the boy," lives in farm country - - and even more so because she does not express fondness for the south she remembers.

As I read farther it became clear my mom's affinity was more specifically for the skinny little boy with an outsize gift for oration. She herself was a self-described "ugly duckling," with an exceptional voice.

Even more significantly, the boy's childhood inner-dialogue sounds a lot like my own mother's memories of being bewildered by prevailing social custom, particularly with regard to relations between blacks and whites, rich and poor, male and female.

I don't think my mom was quite as precocious as "the boy," and I rather doubt Sams himself was, either. But exactly when they each arrived at their shared rejection of "just the way things are," is irrelevant.

It's clear that in subsequent books the boy," will grow into an adult rejects casual acceptance of social and economic unfairness and adopts a world view counter to his upbringing.

My mother never became a civil rights "activist," but as she matured, she became an increasingly confident and outspoken rule-breaker and progressive role model for her students and for me.

They both predate the organized activism of the 60s but they and others like them helped lay fertile ground for it.

I don't plan to continue the series, but having read this one, it is no surprise that my mom came to think of Ferrol Sams as a friend. I am thankful she had him. ( )

2.5 stars, rounded up.

It is difficult not to feel some affinity with a book that is set in a place you know. I was born and raised in the Piedmont of Georgia, born in Crawford W. Long hospital, strolled many a time on Peachtree Street, and have set on the porch at the Fayetteville Courthouse. So, this was like a stroll through my childhood in some ways, but it was a departure from it, as well, and in ways that I was very grateful for. Perhaps that much changed between the 1930’s, when this book is set, and the 1950’s, when I grew up there; perhaps there was a great deal of poetic license taken.

White children did not say, “Yes, sir” or “Yes, ma’am” to a colored person. Well, maybe in Dr. Sams family they were taught that way, but if you wanted a switch taken to your bottom by my Mama, fail to address any person, of any color, in less than respectful terms and you would get it. The colored women we knew well were called “Miz”, just like the white women we knew well. Sir and Ma’am not optional for anyone else.

I wanted to love it, but I couldn’t. I was never able to connect with Porter Osbourne, the boy who is coming of age here. The constant referral to his as “the boy” bothered me. I wondered at his preoccupation with all things sexual and scatalogical. Perhaps that is the difference between a Southern girl and a Southern boy, but neither of those things would have gotten any overt attention from me or my friends at age eight or nine.

I did appreciate what Dr. Sams was portraying in the relationship between this boy and his father, I just felt that got too little of the 422 pages, while one anecdote after another seemed strained and sometimes disconnected.

There is a liberal use of Southern axioms and speech that often rings very true. I could close my eyes and hear the words spilling from the mouths of my own grandparents or parents. It made me sad to think that those times are gone and those phrases are probably uttered by few in today’s world.

When one is convinced that one is to the manor born, the actual physical condition of the manor itself is of negligible importance. Oh my, how true...the name was the thing.

The snuff dipping grandmother made me laugh aloud, because I knew “ladies” who dipped and pretended no one knew. Ah, but we saw so little of her; she was a flash on the page and gone.

This is one of those books that I will not regret reading, but will not treasure the memory of, either. I don’t think I will be tempted to read the next book in the series.
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Young Porter Osborne is the scion of his prosperous farming family in Georgia (presumably as they go to Atlanta now and then). At the start he is pre-adolescent and this novel takes him through high school. He is very small, always, for his age, behind his peers puberty-wise, but not in intellect or, frankly, guile, which he uses to his advantage as he deems necessary. Sams manages to tread the treacherous border between what he, as a white lad, and his home friends, as black lads, can expect. The book, taking place as it does during that time period of a person's life where the lightbulb comes on about injustice, has to convince us that Porter is awakening with a true and unblinking conscience. I'm convinced that Porter is smart as a whip, too smart to be fooled by convention, and one of the lucky few with a vocation. At the same time, for all that, he is a privileged white boy and thus cannot, any more than any other person in that time and place (30's) avoid having certain things both dinned into or expected of him. He can be cruel, albeit rarely and usually with great regret, and he can make mistakes. Sams tells this story with humor and grace. Anything less than that and I'd have had to throw the book in the dumpster. As a matter of interest, I am reading this at the same time as I am reading [The Warmth of Other Suns] and the stories align. Sams is unflinching when necessary. A last word -- there are some truly funny scenes and situations -- the book is very balanced that way -- and the portrait of life in those times has the ring of deadly accuracy -- say, hog-killing day, cotton picking time, the progression of the agricultural and social events of the year. Reminiscent of William Maxwell's [So Long, See You Tomorrow], William McPherson, [Testing the Current] and many others--one is reading of a moment in time and place. ****1/2 ( )

3.5***

This is a semi-autobiographical novel detailing the coming of age of a young boy – the scion of a well-to-do cotton farmer in rural George, during the Depression. The Boy is the only son of a refined and long-suffering mother and an alcoholic, politically connected father. He is smart and resourceful, but confused about much of the information that he gathers by eavesdropping on the adults on and around the farm. He frequently feels alone, in part because he has only sisters, but also because he is so small compared to his classmates. The book covers his story from early childhood through high school.

The style of writing is somewhat stilted and distant. I had a hard time connecting to the boy and his circumstances. However, about 1/3 of the way through the book I grew to really enjoy the story of his journey to young adulthood. There are laugh-out-loud escapades, moments of tender young love, and scenes of horrible corporal punishment (which was wide spread and tolerated both at home and at school during that era). I found myself applauding his triumphs, and cheering for him as he grew into a morally strong young gentleman.
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