Serena by Ron Rash

Serena by Ron Rash

A New York Times Notable Book. Inspiration for the film starring Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper.

The year is 1929, and newlyweds George and Serena Pemberton travel from Boston to the Northa Carolina mountains where they plan to create a timber empire. Although George has already lived in the camp long enough to father an illegitimate child, Serena is new to the mountains--but she soon shows herself to be the equal of any man, overseeing crews, hunting rattlesnakes, even saving her husband's life in the wilderness. Together this lord and lady of the woodlands ruthlessly kill or vanquish all who fall out of favor. Yet when Serena learns that she will never bear a child, she sets out to murder the son George fathered without her. Mother and child begin a struggle for their lives, and when Serena suspects George is protecting his illegitimate family, the Pembertons' intense, passionate marriage starts to unravel as the story moves toward its shocking reckoning.

Rash's masterful balance of violence and beauty yields a riveting novel that, at its core, tells of love honored and betrayed.

Ron Rash is the author of various collections of poetry and short stories, as well as the prize-winning novels One Foot in Eden, Saints at the River, and The World Made Straight. He has been awarded an O. The Fellowship of Southern Writers awarded him the Henry Prize and the James Still Award. He won the 2004 Weatherford Award for Best Novel and the 2005 SEBA Best Book Award for Fiction for Saints at the River. Rash lives in Clemson, South Carolina, and holds the John Parris Chair in Appalachian Studies at Western Carolina University.