Robert Gipe, author of the award-winning 2015 illustrated novel “ Trampoline ," has just published “ Weedeater ," which continues the story of reluctant heroine Dawn Jewell and is the second book in a planned trilogy.
He wrote about the novel for the “Behind the Book” web column for national book review publication, BookPage .
In his piece, titled “ In the Place I Live: Welcome to Rural Kentucky and Weedeater ,” Gipe writes, “I wrote “ Weedeater”knowing people who live where I do also read books. So I try to write something for them that deals with what is hard, but also catches how much fun we have, and how much spirit for surviving we have, and I try to write books that mess around with ideas about how things could maybe get better. But then I also write books to try and catch what it’s like when a whole bunch of things go wrong at once for readers for whom not so many things have gone wrong.”
Gipe’s deep empathy for his characters and the real-life people who inspire him, along with his refusal to bow to sentimentality and his unerring ear for dialect, have won him a fervent following and rapturous reviews.
Most recently, Chapter16.org, an arm of Humanities Tennessee, reviewed the book, saying, “ His characters come across as absolutely real, simultaneously funny and heartbreaking .”
“Weedeater” and “Trampoline” are 20 percent off on the Ohio University Press website, www.ohioswallow.com , and available everywhere books are sold.