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WORK TITLE: The Ice House
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE:
WEBSITE: https://lauraleesmith.com/
CITY: St. Augustine
STATE: FL
COUNTRY: United States
NATIONALITY: American
RESEARCHER NOTES:
PERSONAL
Children: two.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Writer.
AWARDS:Recipient of literary awards.
WRITINGS
Contributor to anthologies, including Best American Short Stories, 2015, and New Stories from the South: The Year’s Best, 2010. Contributor to publications, including the Florida Review, New England Review, Bayou, and Natural Bridge. Contributor to Swamp Radio.
SIDELIGHTS
Laura Lee Smith is a writer based in St. Augustine, FL. She has written stories that have appeared in publications, including the Florida Review, New England Review, Bayou, and Natural Bridge.
Heart of Palm
Heart of Palm, Smith’s first novel, tells the story of the Bravo family. The matriarch of the family is Arla, who grew up in a prominent family in the rural town of Utina, FL. Against her mother’s advice, she married the local bad boy, Dean, who ultimately left her. Their children are Sofia, Carson, and Frank. Another son, Will, died years earlier. Carson is an investment banker running a Ponzi scheme in St. Augustine. Sofia, who struggles with mental health issues, has been living on the family’s land in Utica. Frank manages a restaurant and pines for Elizabeth, Carson’s wife. A company offers the family a large sum of money for their land, and the Bravos argue about whether or not to accept it.
“Heart of Palm is Smith’s first novel, and it’s a knockout,” asserted Colette Bancroft in the Tampa Bay Times. Bancroft praised “its knowing but sweet-natured humor, its flawed and believable characters, its convincing depiction of small-town life, its delicious little plot twists and its insight about the human heart.” Bancroft concluded: “Smith, who lives in St. Augustine, creates a vivid sense of place, viewing Florida with a loving but unsentimental eye. Happily, she captures the Southern rhythms of her characters’ speech without having to resort to outlandish dialect writing.” Xpress Reviews critic, Amy Watts, described Heart of Palm as an “outstanding debut novel” and “an engrossing and rewarding read.” A reviewer in Publishers Weekly remarked: “Smith’s debut novel exudes authenticity.” The same reviewer continued: “Writing with agility and empathy, Smith ends this atmospheric family saga on a note of reconciliation and forgiveness.” “Smith overlaps territory John Sayles explored in Sunshine State, but with a more generous sense of our foibles. It’s a promising start—and a lot of fun,” wrote a Kirkus Reviews contributor.
The Ice House
In The Ice House, Johnny MacKinnon, originally from Scotland, runs an ice plant in Florida. The feds accuse him of negligence connected to a gas leak in the plant around the same time he learns he has a cyst in his brain. Johnny goes to visit his ex-wife and drug-addicted son in Scotland.
In an interview with a contributor to the Mindy Friddle website, Smith stated: “My grandfather Johnny Readie immigrated to America from Glasgow, Scotland, in 1924, when he was fourteen. He built a business here and raised a family, and I remember being charmed as a kid by his stories of Scotland and fascinated with the idea that he left one country to make a life in another.” Smith continued: “He is the inspiration for my character Johnny MacKinnon in The Ice House, but only to the extent that both Johnnys were Scottish immigrants who worked hard to build a business in the United States. The fictional Johnny quickly became his own person. He’s sarcastic and stubborn and brusque, whereas my own grandfather was actually warm and charming and loving. But Johnny MacKinnon has a very soft heart, underneath his tough exterior. I suppose they have that in common as well.” Regarding the two settings of the book, Smith told C.D. Davidson-Hiers, writer on the Tallahassee Democrat Online: “Scotland is very cold, it’s very ancient, it’s very austere, very rugged. And to put those two locations in contrast to each other was really an exercise in, I don’t know, these polar opposite places.” Smith added: “And it was a lot of fun because when I was writing in Florida, it was really hot and steamy and sticky and then I had the characters go to Scotland and they were facing this other challenge of trying to keep warm and it was damp and it was cold and it was harsh. And the reason I included Scotland in the story is because it figures very strongly in my own family history.”
Bancroft, writing here on the online version of the Tampa Bay Times, commented on the book’s main characters, stating: “Smith weaves their stories expertly, moving from Jacksonville to Scotland and back, from another disaster to a laugh-out-loud moment. Her tenderness toward her characters and subtle understanding of class differences in American society are reminiscent of such novelists as Richard Russo and Jennifer Egan, but this heartbreaking, heartwarming novel is an original.” “Smith … majestically captures the urgency of reconnecting with a loved one when time seems to be quickly slipping away,” asserted a contributor to the Publishers Weekly website. Reviewing the volume on the BookPage website, Thane Tierney remarked: “Smith has a flair for creating three-dimensional characters who are flawed and heroic in the small ways that most of us are. … She is able to rivet the reader.” A Kirkus Reviews critic suggested: “Insight, good humor, and generous hearts abound in this readable but baggy saga of starting afresh, which opens with originality but closes with an excess of tidily ticked boxes.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Kirkus Reviews, February 15, 2013, review of Heart of Palm; September 15, 2017, review of The Ice House.
Publishers Weekly, January 28, 2013, review of Heart of Palm, p. 150.
Tampa Bay Times, April 7, 2013, Colette Bancroft, review of Heart of Palm, p. 7L.
Xpress Reviews, March 29, 2013, Amy Watts, review of Heart of Palm.
ONLINE
BookPage Online, https://bookpage.com/ (December 5, 2017), Thane Tierney, review of The Ice House.
Laura Lee Smith Website, https://lauraleesmith.com (May 9, 2018).
Mindy Friddle Website, http://www.mindyfriddle.com/ (May 9, 2018), author interview.
Publishers Weekly Online, https://www.publishersweekly.com/ (September 25, 2017), review of The Ice House.
Tallahassee Democrat Online, https://www.tallahassee.com/ (January 18, 2018), C.D. Davidson-Hiers, author interview.
Tampa Bay Times Online, http://www.tampabay.com/ (November 3, 2017), Colette Bancroft, review of The Ice House.
Laura Lee Smith is the author of the novels THE ICE HOUSE (Grove Press 2017) and HEART OF PALM (Grove Press 2013). Her short fiction has been anthologized in BEST AMERICAN SHORT STORIES (2015) and NEW STORIES FROM THE SOUTH: THE YEAR'S BEST (2010). A writer who’s been praised for her “intelligence, heart, and wit” (Richard Russo, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Empire Falls), Smith has won awards and accolades from across the United States, and her work has been translated into German and French. She lives in Florida, where she writes fiction and works as a copywriter. www.lauraleesmith.com
QUOTED: "Scotland is very cold, it’s very ancient, it’s very austere, very rugged. And to put those two locations in contrast to each other was really an exercise in, I don’t know, these polar opposite places."
"And it was a lot of fun because when I was writing in Florida, it was really hot and steamy and sticky and then I had the characters go to Scotland and they were facing this other challenge of trying to keep warm and it was damp and it was cold and it was harsh. And the reason I included Scotland in the story is because it figures very strongly in my own family history."
St. Augustine author Laura Lee Smith discusses place for new novel 'The Ice House'
CD Davidson-Hiers, Democrat staff writer Published 5:38 p.m. ET Jan. 18, 2018
636517890883157243-Smith-Laura-Lee-author-photo---credit-Zach-Thomas.jpg
(Photo: Special to the Democrat)
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Book cover of "The Ice House" by Laura Lee Smith.
Book cover of "The Ice House" by Laura Lee Smith. (Photo: Evelina Kremsdorf)
Grove Atlantic-published author, Laura Lee Smith, will read from and sign copies of her newest book, "The Ice House," Saturday at Midtown Reader on Thomasville Road. Her visit is part of a nine-stop book tour throughout Mississippi, South Carolina, Georgia and Florida.
"The Ice House" follows the intertwining paths of a father and his estranged son, comparing their lifestyles and the landscapes of an ice house owner in Florida with that of a recovering addict in Scotland.
Smith lives in St. Augustine where she writes and works as a copy editor. The Democrat spoke with Smith about her newest book and how landscape continues to influence her work.
Q: What does place mean in your novels, and how does it unfold?
A: Place has always been super important to me in writing fiction, whether short fiction or in both of my novels. I am so in love with the place I live ... such a spooky and mysterious kind of mystical place. It’s just this incubator for stories and for fiction. So in all my fiction, place becomes almost like a character in the story because it exerts influence over the other characters and it can sometimes direct or affect the way that they’re going to behave or the way that they’re going to respond to each other ... I love having that at my disposal ... it just ratchets up the tension in a story and I think tension is one of the most important tools a fiction writer has to develop narrative.
Q: Speaking of tension, in “The Ice House,” you have a tension between not only Northeast Florida, but Scotland as well. Can you talk a little bit about the tension of the two places?
Scotland is very cold, it’s very ancient, it’s very austere, very rugged. And to put those two locations in contrast to each other was really an exercise in, I don’t know, these polar opposite places. And it was a lot of fun because when I was writing in Florida, it was really hot and steamy and sticky and then I had the characters go to Scotland and they were facing this other challenge of trying to keep warm and it was damp and it was cold and it was harsh. And the reason I included Scotland in the story is because it figures very strongly in my own family history. My grandfather was from Scotland and my family has traveled there a number of times. So to be a Floridian who has spent time in Scotland gave me a real sense of contrast that I wanted to play with in the book.
Q: Your book is also about the relationship between a father and an estranged son. The father's Florida ice house is facing OSHA fines and he then realizes he has a brain tumor. What is it like to choose what happens to your characters and emotionally grapple with the consequences?
A: I think that I and a lot of fiction writers try to train ourselves to be very attentive to incidents in the world that could potentially feed character development. So when I run across something ... it's almost like you're not experiencing your own life for the sake of your own life — you’re squirreling it away and seeing how you can later use it. You hand it to one of your own characters and see how he or she will respond. So I try to do that with little stuff and big stuff: Dropping your keys or the wrong meal is brought to you in a restaurant – that’s just little incidents. But there’s big stuff, too: A medical diagnosis. So, I have a notebook and when stuff comes across my consciousness – meningioma – then off you go to Google to figure out what’s a meningioma, what’s a diagnosis, what can happen. So it’s very organic, it just keeps evolving.
Q: Do you ever get bogged down in the practical details of things?
A: Oh yeah, absolutely. That OSHA investigation really gave me fits because in real life — I’m kind of a stickler for authenticity and details — there are very specific steps to an OSHA investigation and there are specific processes and things that happen (fines, appeal), so I spent a lot of time on the Occupational Safety and Health website trying to learn. And the specifics of ice manufacturing, I felt I had to learn a lot about that.
In fiction, you have to watch for that – verisimilitude. You have to have enough reality and accuracy to convince your reader that they’re in a world that’s true, but at the same time you’re also telling a story so you have to give yourself a bit of license to make it fit your narrative.
Q: That’s a lot of patience and determination you have to have.
A: It is. And that’s the thing I learned from the first book — I was better with the second book, I was more patient. But, I was amazed at the pace of the first book. And I have talked to other writers or aspiring writers or students and I have tried to express to them that, if you want it done right and you want it done well ... I had to be willing to be patient. And I have a really good publisher. I’m super lucky and I’m super proud to be with Grove (Atlantic) Press because they’re well known for quality.
Q: Have there been moments where, once you’ve been published, you’ve been star-struck?
A: It does happen when I go to events where I see writers I’ve revered for a long time. You know, you can’t believe these are real people just like we are. So that happens quite a lot because I have had the good fortune to travel and go to events like the Miami Book Fair, last fall, and the Tampa Bay Festival of Reading.
But the most exciting thing for me is when readers start asking me questions or commenting on my characters as though they know them. And that’s a knockout. It’s thrilling. I get chills. Because you walk around for — in my case both my books took me five years to write — with those characters dwelling only in my own head. Nobody else had ever heard of them. So for a reader to say something to me about a character or say I liked it when Johnny did this or Pauline did this … that’s kind of earth-shattering to me.
Q: Five years total, or five years each?
A: Five years each; the development from start to finish. And I wouldn’t say I was slaving away every day on them for five years, but lot of drafts … there was a lot of times the manuscript was with my editor or with my agent or we were waiting for something to happen: Cover design or typesetting.
Q: What’s next?
A: Well, all of next week is book tour which is really exciting. I’ll be in Tallahassee the end of the week, but prior to that I’ll be in South Carolina ... lots of traveling. I’m really excited about that, but I also have another novel manuscript that’s beginning to cook and I feel good about it. It’s set in St. Augustine which I feel great about because I’m coming back home. My first book was set closer to St. Augustine, the second book was Jacksonville and Scotland, which was a little further afield for me. This book is back in St. Augustine and I’m excited about it because St. Augustine got really beat up the last couple of years. We had two really wicked hurricanes come through. A lot of my friends and neighbors suffered really significant losses and there’s a feeling around here these days of camaraderie and a feeling that we’ve all been through something. It’s kind of funny, I have this renewed love for St. Augustine even though she sort of betrayed me a little bit over the last couple years, but you just feel even more connected to a place after it’s been beaten up a little bit.
If you go:
What: Author Laura Lee Smith's book reading and signing of newest novel "The Ice House"
When: Saturday, 6-7:30 p.m.
Where: Midtown Reader, 1123 Thomasville Road
Cost: Free to attend; books will be available for purchase.
For more information, visit midtownreader.com.
Reach CD Davidson-Hiers at cdavidsonh@tallahassee.com or on Twitter @DavidsonHiers.
QUOTED: "My grandfather Johnny Readie immigrated to America from Glasgow, Scotland, in 1924, when he was fourteen. He built a business here and raised a family, and I remember being charmed as a kid by his stories of Scotland and fascinated with the idea that he left one country to make a life in another."
"He is the inspiration for my character Johnny MacKinnon in The Ice House, but only to the extent that both Johnnys were Scottish immigrants who worked hard to build a business in the United States. The fictional Johnny quickly became his own person. He’s sarcastic and stubborn and brusque, whereas my own grandfather was actually warm and charming and loving. But Johnny MacKinnon has a very soft heart, underneath his tough exterior. I suppose they have that in common as well."
Laura Lee Smith is the author of two novels: THE ICE HOUSE (December 5, 2017) and HEART OF PALM (2013), both from Grove Press. Her short fiction was selected by guest editor T.C. Boyle for inclusion in Best American Short Stories 2015 and by guest editor Amy Hempel for inclusion in New Stories from the South: The Year’s Best, 2010.
Laura's work has also appeared in New England Review, The Florida Review, Natural Bridge, Bayou, and other journals, and she is a frequent contributor to Swamp Radio. She works as an advertising copywriter.
Laura, who lives in Florida, is on book tour for THE ICE HOUSE, a Fall 2017 Okra Pick. She stopped by independent bookstore M.Judson Booksellers in Greenville, SC on Monday to read from her novel and to talk about writing.
Laura and her agent, Judith Weber of Sobel Weber. Judith arrived from New York to attend the reading. It was the first time in Greenville, SC for both...and I had the pleasure to serve as tour guide!
Laura and her agent, Judith Weber of Sobel Weber. Judith arrived from New York to attend the reading. It was the first time in Greenville, SC for both...and I had the pleasure to serve as tour guide!
About your writing trajectory. You wrote short stories before you were "discovered" and then wrote a novel...how did that unfold?
I didn’t start writing fiction until I was in my mid-thirties. Before then, I lacked the confidence to try my hand at developing characters and narratives. But I was always a passionate reader, and I’ve always worked as a business writer, so I suppose I was developing certain skills along the way—focus, concentration, the patience for revision. I used to be regretful that I didn’t start writing until a bit later in my life, but now I actually value that delay. It helped me mature, and it ensured that I didn’t rush to publication like some young writers do.
So anyway, I started in my thirties, submitting short stories to literary magazines. I received many, many rejections. But I was mature enough at that point to make a choice for tenacity, and I kept going. Eventually, agent Nat Sobel of Sobel Weber spotted one of my stories in a small literary magazine and wrote to ask if I had a novel. I had a loose start on a novel, but I spotted the opportunity in Nat’s inquiry, and I worked like mad to get the manuscript into shape. That manuscript became my first novel, HEART OF PALM (2013). I now work with Nat’s wife and business partner, Judith Weber, as do you, Mindy. I know we are both grateful for Judith’s wise and graceful representation.
“Eventually, agent Nat Sobel spotted one of my stories in a small literary magazine and wrote to ask if I had a novel. I had a loose start on a novel, but I spotted the opportunity in Nat’s inquiry, and I worked like mad to get the manuscript into shape. That manuscript became my first novel”
Laura Lee Smith, right, at M.Judson Booksellers. Laura is on tour for THE ICE HOUSE, her latest novel. That's me on the left, in conversation with Laura.
Laura Lee Smith, right, at M.Judson Booksellers. Laura is on tour for THE ICE HOUSE, her latest novel. That's me on the left, in conversation with Laura.
You are at your desk by 5 a.m. to write. How long have you done it, and how does that help the magic happen?
I’ve been doing it for years—probably since my kids were babies, and they’re now 19 and 21. In the beginning, I got up early because I was commuting to a job and raising small kids. Pre-dawn was the only time I could consistently count on to have uninterrupted quiet. Through the years, it’s simply become a habit, and a good one. I love the early morning quiet of the house, the way there are no expectations on you to do anything else at that hour. Because I now work from home, I don’t have the grind of the long commute, which is wonderful.But once my job duties start kicking in for the day, usually around 9:00, the opportunity for quiet concentration and creating a fictional dream is gone. So 5:00 it is. Coffee helps.
You have talked about how your grandfather's story of coming to America from Scotland inspired your writing of The Ice House. How so?
My grandfather Johnny Readie immigrated to America from Glasgow, Scotland, in 1924, when he was fourteen. He built a business here and raised a family, and I remember being charmed as a kid by his stories of Scotland and fascinated with the idea that he left one country to make a life in another. He is the inspiration for my character Johnny MacKinnon in The Ice House, but only to the extent that both Johnnys were Scottish immigrants who worked hard to build a business in the United States. The fictional Johnny quickly became his own person. He’s sarcastic and stubborn and brusque, whereas my own grandfather was actually warm and charming and loving. But Johnny MacKinnon has a very soft heart, underneath his tough exterior. I suppose they have that in common as well.
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Both your novels and your short stories have great comic moments. Can you say a little about how humor burbles up in your work, even in darker moments?
I like to laugh. And maybe it’s my nervous disposition, but I find myself laughing often, even during times of stress or conflict…it’s a release to laugh, and I think that we humans often behave in ways that are simply hilarious. So it feels natural for me to allow my characters to laugh at each other and laugh at themselves. Sometimes the characters are not actually laughing, but their responses to stressors are humorous, which allows readers to laugh and builds a bit of sympathy and compassion for the characters. I think humor in my work is also a byproduct of the fact that I know my characters very well. I feel comfortable inside their heads, so when something happens that presents an opportunity for a funny response from a character, it comes fairly easily.
Most writers have side hustles and gigs to keep the lights on. Say a little about your day job, and how you weave your writing into your work day.
I work for Steinway & Sons pianos as a copywriter and project manager. It’s a very good gig. . .the company is in New York, but I work at home in Florida and have a great deal of flexibility in how I manage my time. Plus, it’s a company I’m proud to work for—the culture of Steinway is focused on the art of music and the artistry of fine piano making. I feel like I’m contributing to a valuable and creative entity. That said, it’s hard—as it is for any writer—to balance the demands of a day job with the desire to spend time with fictional characters. I struggle with that. And more and more, the demands of managing a writing career have been encroaching on writing time. I try to keep in touch with readers, respond to requests for visits, look for opportunities to connect with booksellers—all of these things are important elements of building a career and helping my books make their way into readers’ hands. But if I’m not careful, these efforts take time away from actually creating the work. The only answer is I have found is to get up very early in the morning to work on fiction. Most writers I know have fantasies about being able to write and read full time. I’m no exception.
“I’m most excited about life when I’m inside the fictional dream, when I’m working on bringing characters through a journey and I find myself lost in reverie,”
A few more pearls of wisdom to share, please?
I feel grateful to be in the storytelling business. It’s a gift. I’m most excited about life when I’m inside the fictional dream, when I’m working on bringing characters through a journey and I find myself lost in reverie, building lives and conflicts and resolutions just by typing words onto a page. It’s a miraculous thing. It doesn’t always work the way I want it to, and sometimes it’s hard and discouraging, but when the work is going well, I feel real joy. I hope that energy is transmitted to my readers—that would be my greatest wish, in fact, as a writer. If I can gift someone the reverie of a well-told story, I’ll be happy.
Laura Lee Smith is the author of two novels: THE ICE HOUSE (December 5, 2017) and HEART OF PALM (2013), both from Grove Press. Her short fiction was selected by guest editor T.C. Boyle for inclusion in Best American Short Stories 2015 and by guest editor Amy Hempel for inclusion in New Stories from the South: The Year’s Best, 2010. Her work has also appeared in New England Review, The Florida Review, Natural Bridge, Bayou, and other journals, and she is a frequent contributor to Swamp Radio. She works as an advertising copywriter. laurals@bellsouth.net
Novels
THE ICE HOUSE, Grove Press (2017). From a writer who’s been praised for her “intelligence, heart, wit” (Richard Russo, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of EMPIRE FALLS), THE ICE HOUSE follows the beleaguered MacKinnons as they weather the possible loss of the family business, a serious medical diagnosis, and the slings and arrows of familial discord.
Short Fiction
“Unsafe at Any Speed,” New England Review #35.1, Winter 2014 and Best American Short Stories 2015.
“This Trembling Earth,” Natural Bridge #22 and New Stories from the South: The Year’s Best, 2010
“Da Nang Hummingbirds,” Bayou #53
“Yulee Blues,” Snake Nation Review #23
“You Are a Temporary,” Main Street Rag, Fall 2009
“Miracle,” The Florida Review #31.1
Non-Fiction
“On Rejection,” Bridle Path Press, February 2012
Natural Writer: A Story about Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings, Carolrhoda Books, 2001. (With Judy Cook)
QUOTED: "Insight, good humor, and generous hearts abound in this readable but baggy saga of starting afresh, which opens with originality but closes with an excess of tidily ticked boxes."
Smith, Laura Lee: THE ICE HOUSE
Kirkus Reviews. (Sept. 15, 2017):
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Full Text:
Smith, Laura Lee THE ICE HOUSE Grove (Adult Fiction) $25.00 12, 5 ISBN: 978-0-8021-2708-2
The pileup of crises in the life of a Scottish-born businessman comes with a silver lining: an opportunity to mend old wounds and make things right.It never rains but it pours these days for Johnny MacKinnon, who has been diagnosed with a potentially cancerous brain cyst just as the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration has brought a claim of negligence against his creaky old ice-making factory, the Bold City Ice Plant, after a leak of ammonia gas. The fines could sink the business. Then there's his shattered relationship with his 30-year-old son, Corran, whose heroin addiction has survived three stints in rehab. Father and son are no longer speaking after Corran's last visit, when some important valuables went missing. Is Corran clean, now that he's a single parent to baby daughter Lucy? And what about Johnny's two wives? Current partner Pauline is beginning to regret never having children of her own, while his previous wife, Sharon, is struggling with her own husband's incipient dementia alongside Corran's need for child care help. Smith (Hearts of Palm, 2013) kick-starts her second novel, set (like her first) in the environs of Jacksonville, Florida, with this busy agglomeration of dilemmas but then shifts gear, relinquishing the sense of urgency as Johnny--in the company of a comic-foil teenager, Chemal, who will act as driver--returns to Scotland for an uneasy reunion with Sharon and Corran. Although the clock is ticking on Johnny's brain surgery and the OSHA investigation, the novel meanders indulgently on either side of the Atlantic until a near-death experience reorders the landscape. Now, it turns out, there's a solution to every obstacle. Insight, good humor, and generous hearts abound in this readable but baggy saga of starting afresh, which opens with originality but closes with an excess of tidily ticked boxes.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Smith, Laura Lee: THE ICE HOUSE." Kirkus Reviews, 15 Sept. 2017. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A504217672/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=3a240b13. Accessed 18 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A504217672
QUOTED: "Smith overlaps territory John Sayles explored in Sunshine State, but with a more generous sense of our foibles. It's a promising start—and a lot of fun."
Laura Lee Smith: HEART OF PALM
Kirkus Reviews. (Feb. 15, 2013):
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2013 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Full Text:
Laura Lee Smith HEART OF PALM Grove (Adult Fiction) $25.00 4, 2 ISBN: 978-0-8021-2102-8
Amiable debut novel of life in the nonglitzy part of Florida, the swampy confines of the Georgia borderlands. Utina is a definitive backwater, literally. But it's close enough to Jacksonville and the interstate to be attractive as the site for potential development, a prospect that makes some of its oddball mix of residents very, very happy. From the best family around, Arla Bolton--she of the mangled foot, wherein hangs a tale--went off years before and married Dean Bravo, proving that good girls love bad boys and that, as her mother archly observes, "[l]ove won't be enough." Sure enough, years later, shiftless Dean now smells money in the air. He and Arla, meanwhile, have begat a far-flung family that, as one member puts it, is a "frigging pack of oddballs and failures for whom he'd been wrestling with shame and ambivalence his entire life." Well, so it is with all families. Other characters in Arla's orbit are clearly more worthy of a share, such as the rugged young man named Biaggio, who "was a handsome man, but so beaten. Oh, but they were all so beaten." In a slowly, gently unfolding comedy of manners, Smith skillfully sets multiple stories in motion, most, it seems, designed to showcase the vanity of human wishes. Smith is a kind and understanding creator, and even the most venal of her characters, we see, is just trying to get by--and usually not succeeding. In the end, Smith overlaps territory John Sayles explored in Sunshine State, but with a more generous sense of our foibles. It's a promising start--and a lot of fun.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Laura Lee Smith: HEART OF PALM." Kirkus Reviews, 15 Feb. 2013. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A318463654/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=079872b8. Accessed 18 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A318463654
QUOTED: "Smith's debut novel exudes authenticity."
"Writing with agility and empathy, Smith ends this atmospheric family saga on a note of reconciliation and forgiveness."
Heart of Palm
Publishers Weekly. 260.4 (Jan. 28, 2013): p150.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2013 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
Heart of Palm Laura Lee Smith. Grove, $24 (496p) ISBN 978-0-8021-2102-8
Independence Day is a turning point for the Bravo family of small-town Utina on Florida's Intracoastal Waterway. It's the day they must consider a multimillion-dollar offer for the formerly backwoods, now valuable, land surrounding the family restaurant and their adjacent home. For the contentious brood's matriarch, 62year-old Arla, the deal would mean ending the reclusive life she's led since her feckless husband Dean decamped two decades ago. For her emotionally volatile daughter, Sofia, it would mean losing her home. For Carson, the eldest son, the windfall could cover the Ponzi scheme he's been running out of his St. Augustine investment firm, while for middle son Frank, the restaurant manager, it might mean a new beginning with Carson's wife, Elizabeth. For all of them, accepting the offer would involve leaving the place where the youngest brother, Will, died tragically 20 years ago on July 4, the victim of his father's irresponsibility and his brothers' jealousy. The Bravos, once notorious Utina badasses, find their adult ties of guilt and regret beginning to frazzle as long-dormant resentments emerge. Smith's debut novel exudes authenticity as she chronicles the lives of her "Southern Crackers," mired in bad behavior and feelings of inferiority. She turns a phrase with wit, especially when good old boys discuss football (the Florida Gators) and sex. Like a long hot summer, the plot meanders through daily events and combustible emotions, but gains depth with a prodigal's return, a wedding, a marital separation, two deaths (spoiler alert: one is a dog), a sibling brawl, a botched shooting, and a surprising final twist. Writing with agility and empathy, Smith ends this atmospheric family saga on a note of reconciliation and forgiveness. Agent: Judith Webw, Sobel Weber Associates. (Apr.)
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Heart of Palm." Publishers Weekly, 28 Jan. 2013, p. 150. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A317202692/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=c9a8ac0c. Accessed 18 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A317202692
QUOTED: "outstanding debut novel" "an engrossing and rewarding read."
Smith, Laura Lee. Heart of Palm
Xpress Reviews. (Mar. 29, 2013):
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2013 Library Journals, LLC
http://www.libraryjournal.com/lj/reviews/xpress/884170-289/xpress_reviews-first_look_at_new.html.csp
Full Text:
[star]Smith, Laura Lee. Heart of Palm. Grove. Apr. 2013. 496p. ISBN 9780802121028. $24; ebk. ISBN 9780802193568. F This outstanding debut novel tells the story of the Bravo family, headed by matriarch Arla. Arla was once a sought-after beauty from a wealthy family in St. Augustine, FL, Dean Bravo stole her heart--Dean Bravo of the Utina Bravos, a family known for lawlessness and troublemaking in the trashy town nearby. Tragedy strikes on their honeymoon, and the young couple are never quite the same. In the present day, long after Dean's subsequent desertion of Arla and their kids, the Bravos are sitting on now-valuable real estate, but whether it's up for sale is a fight within the family: Carson, a shady "investment counselor"; Elizabeth, his long-suffering wife; Sofia, the oldest and only daugher, dealing with mental health issues; and Frank, the stoic defender of everyone else, denying his own dreams.
Verdict Reminiscent of the works of John Irving, with its close-knit but oddball family, weird tragedy at regular intervals, and its very dark sense of humor, this is an engrossing and rewarding read.--Amy Watts, Univ. of Georgia Lib., Athens
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Smith, Laura Lee. Heart of Palm." Xpress Reviews, 29 Mar. 2013. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A327109363/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=ad2d209d. Accessed 18 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A327109363
QUOTED: "Heart of Palm is Smith's first novel, and it's a knockout."
"its knowing but sweet-natured humor, its flawed and believable characters, its convincing depiction of small-town life, its delicious little plot twists and its insight about the human heart."
"Smith, who lives in St. Augustine, creates a vivid sense of place, viewing Florida with a loving but unsentimental eye. Happily, she captures the Southern rhythms of her characters' speech without having to resort to outlandish dialect writing."
IN 'HEART OF PALM,' LIVING ON THE EDGE OF FLORIDA; Change in their town and their own lives is a challenge for the Bravo family
Colette Bancroft
Tampa Bay Times (St. Petersburg, FL). (Apr. 7, 2013): News: p7L.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2013 Times Publishing Company
http://www.tampabay.com/
Full Text:
Byline: COLETTE BANCROFT; TIMES BOOK EDITOR
In many ways, Laura Lee Smith's Florida-set debut novel, Heart of Palm, is about loving things to death - places and people.
It's set in Utina, a bitty town on the Intracoastal between St. Augustine and Jacksonville, the kind of sleepy place you might find if you get off the interstate and past the suburbs, the kind natives and long-timers call "Old Florida." The fictional Utina, Smith writes, "inauspiciously named for the chief of a tribe of doomed Timucuan Indians, had been known historically for two things: palms and booze." The markets for Palm Sunday fronds and moonshine vanished decades ago, but now, in the 21st century, Utina is poised for transformation: Real estate developers from as far away as Atlanta are sniffing around its waterfront properties, and the town's first Publix is going up.
Whether to sell is just one of the problems confronting the Bravo family, whose story is the bruised, brave heart of Smith's book. There's matriarch Arla Bravo, still a statuesque, red-haired beauty at 60, who lost half her left foot on her honeymoon but rules her household with an iron hand.
Situated on the Intracoastal in a crumbling three-story Queen Anne mansion called Aberdeen, that household consists of Arla, her handsome but half-crazy daughter, Sofia, and one Biaggio Dunkirk, "one of those West Virginia corn-fed badasses who'd seen the inside of a jail cell more than the high school cafeteria" but "has settled down to a quiet life of peace and the systematic avoidance of extradition" in a trailer in the side yard of Aberdeen.
One of Arla's three sons, Frank, hasn't gotten much farther from his childhood home. He lives a few blocks away but works every day as bartender-cook-manager at Uncle Henry's, a fish restaurant perched on the Intracoastal just a 15-minute walk through the woods from Aberdeen, and owned by Arla.
Frank dreamed of college, of living in the North Carolina mountains, of marrying a straight-talking girl named Elizabeth, but at 40 he's still frying fish, pulling drafts and refereeing the fights between Arla and Sofia, the latest of which has left an upright Steinway piano blocking the main hall of their house.
As for Elizabeth, she is now married to Frank's older brother, Carson Bravo, who has gotten as far away as St. Augustine, at least. An investment manager with a nice house and cars, a pretty wife and adorkable daughter, he seems like the Bravo success story - maybe - although he and Frank hardly speak.
Only two Bravos have escaped Utina. Arla's youngest and favorite son, Will, was his brothers' partner in crime when they were all teenagers - they were wild boys whose pranks were usually harmless and unpunished, because "it's hard to dust an alligator for fingerprints." But one night a prank went wrong and Will died, a death that punched a vast hole through the middle of the family that hasn't healed more than twenty years later.
The other escapee is Arla's husband, Dean, who walked out after Will's death and hasn't been heard from since. Dean was the proud progenitor of his sons' wild ways, a Utina native descended from Spanish immigrants. As a young man, Dean's dark good looks, startling blue eyes and sexy swagger made him notorious even in St. Augustine - as he finds out in the novel's prologue. Driving a lonesome road toward that city one day in 1963, Dean happens upon a vision that will shape his whole life: a 6-foot-tall girl with "skin like white linen" and a braid of red hair, walking along the road wearing nothing but a sky-blue bikini and a pair of sandals.
"You're Dean Bravo" are the first words Arla says to him as she steps into his truck, and he's a goner, even though he knows her upper-class family will be horrified at the idea of marrying their only child to a redneck bad boy like him. The story of their swift romance and its sudden demise, told with breathtaking skill and steamy detail in the prologue, sets the stage for the rest of the novel.
Heart of Palm is Smith's first novel, and it's a knockout. With its knowing but sweet-natured humor, its flawed and believable characters, its convincing depiction of small-town life, its delicious little plot twists and its insight about the human heart, it reminded me often of the novels of Richard Russo, especially Nobody's Fool and Empire Falls.
Smith, who lives in St. Augustine, creates a vivid sense of place, viewing Florida with a loving but unsentimental eye. Happily, she captures the Southern rhythms of her characters' speech without having to resort to outlandish dialect writing, and she deftly peels back the layers of family relationships. She's a welcome addition to the ranks of Florida writers, and Heart of Palm is a fine, bittersweet taste of the Sunshine State.
Colette Bancroft can be reached at cbancroft@tampabay.com or (727) 893-8435.
* * *
Heart of Palm
By Laura Lee Smith
Grove Press, 452 pages, $25
Meet the author
Laura Lee Smith will discuss and sign her debut novel at 6 p.m. Wednesday at Inkwood Books, 216 S Armenia Ave., Tampa.
CAPTION(S):
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COLETTE BANCROFT; TIMES BOOK EDITOR
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Bancroft, Colette. "IN 'HEART OF PALM,' LIVING ON THE EDGE OF FLORIDA; Change in their town and their own lives is a challenge for the Bravo family." Tampa Bay Times [St. Petersburg, FL], 7 Apr. 2013, p. 7L. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A325317499/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=ffdcccf3. Accessed 18 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A325317499
QUOTED: "Smith has a flair for creating three-dimensional characters who are flawed and heroic in the small ways that most of us are. ... She is able to rivet the reader."
Web Exclusive – December 05, 2017
THE ICE HOUSE
Home is a long way from here
BookPage review by Thane Tierney
The Scots didn’t invent stubbornness, but they perfected it, raised it to a high art where irresistible force and immovable object are sometimes locked like two neutron stars in a perilous dance. So it is with American immigrant Johnny MacKinnon and his Scottish son, Corran, in Laura Lee Smith’s second novel, The Ice House.
The elder MacKinnon is the COO of Bold City Ice in Jacksonville; his son is a recovering heroin addict and oil rig worker living near Loch Lomond. And while an actual ocean separates father and son, a more treacherous emotional ocean—strewn with a fair bit of ice—separates the two as well. On top of that, Johnny’s business is facing a potential bankruptcy due to a suspicious industrial accident, and he has been diagnosed with what might either be a benign cyst or a life-threatening tumor in his brain. Against his wife’s wishes and his doctor’s advice, MacKinnon decides to hit the road to the auld sod in order to—make amends? Find closure with his estranged son? Elicit a long-overdue apology? All of the above?
As the famous Scots poet Robert Burns noted, the best-laid schemes . . . well, you know. Not only were MacKinnon’s plans far from the best laid to begin with, but he’s also left his wife (who is the firm’s CEO) across the sea with a full slate of emotional, legal and financial calamities of her own. What could possibly go wrong?
Smith has a flair for creating three-dimensional characters who are flawed and heroic in the small ways that most of us are, and while her literary milieu is more chamber music than symphony, she is able to rivet the reader for more than 400 pages, which is no wee accomplishment.
Thane Tierney lives in Inglewood, California, and is descended from Scots who once lived on the Isle of Muck in the Inner Hebrides.
QUOTED: "Smith ... majestically captures the urgency of reconnecting with a loved one when time seems to be quickly slipping away."
The Ice House
Laura Lee Smith. Grove, $25 (448p) ISBN 978-0-8021-2708-2
A spirited cast makes up the foundation of Smith’s delicately spun story of family, loyalty, and the difficult choices people must make when forgiving someone. Johnny and Pauline MacKinnon spend their days trying to keep their Florida ice factory afloat as they skirt around the topic of Corran, Johnny’s estranged son from a previous marriage. Corran is believed to have stolen his stepmother’s ring to buy heroin, but is now trying to stay sober and raise his infant daughter in Scotland. Johnny is skeptical of the latest turn in Corran’s behavior, but, after he is diagnosed with a potentially malignant brain tumor, he has to decide how to make use of the weeks leading up to his surgery. Johnny sets off for Scotland to find Corran, leaving Pauline behind to deal with the ice factory’s legal and financial troubles. In a tiny cottage perched near a chilly loch, Corran battles his inner demons, unwilling to acknowledge his father’s belated reconciliation attempts until fresh tragedy forces them together. Peppering the story with affecting interludes that trace the evolution of Johnny and Corran’s relationship, Smith (Heart of Palm) majestically captures the urgency of reconnecting with a loved one when time seems to be quickly slipping away. (Dec.)
DETAILS
Reviewed on: 09/25/2017
Release date: 12/01/2017
Library Binding - 596 pages - 978-1-4328-4914-6
QUOTED: "Smith weaves their stories expertly, moving from Jacksonville to Scotland and back, from another disaster to a laugh-out-loud moment. Her tenderness toward her characters and subtle understanding of class differences in American society are reminiscent of such novelists as Richard Russo and Jennifer Egan, but this heartbreaking, heartwarming novel is an original."
Laura Lee Smith’s ‘The Ice House’ shields disaster, conflict with humor, warmth
Laura Lee Smith
Festival of Reading author mugs, Laura Lee Smith Festival of Reading author mugs, Bahia Honda State Park. Big Pine Key, FL, USA.
Colette Bancroft
Times book editor
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Published: November 3, 2017
y Colette Bancroft
Johnny MacKinnon already has too much on his plate.
The icemaking plant he and his wife, Pauline, own and operate is being investigated after the rupture of an ammonia tank. Johnny’s grown son, Corran, is struggling with heroin addiction, and Johnny’s long marriage, though solid, is showing a few frays. It’s no wonder the MacKinnons’ dog, an elderly dachshund named General San Jose, seems worried all the time.
Then Johnny collapses at work, and the diagnosis is a growth — probably benign but maybe not — in his brain. What next, a plague of frogs?
Why, yes.
All that and more afflicts the MacKinnons in Laura Lee Smith’s new book, The Ice House, yet this novel fairly beams with humor and warmth. Smith makes us feel affection for even her most hapless characters, and surprises us with the turns their lives take.
This is Smith’s second novel, after her auspicious 2013 debut, Heart of Palm. She lives in northeast Florida, and both books are enriched by her area knowledge.
The Ice House is set in Jacksonville, where the MacKinnons run the Bold City Ice Plant, inherited from Pauline’s father, Packy Knight. Pauline has deep roots in north Florida, not all of them pleasant: "As a young man, Packy had been one of a mob of whites who marauded the streets of downtown Jacksonville on a summer day in 1960, wielding ax handles to beat bloody a group of blacks who had staged a sit-in at the lunch counter at W.T. Grant to protest segregation." Packy has dementia now, but his daughter can’t forget.
Johnny is an outsider, an immigrant from Scotland who arrived, dead broke, after the collapse of his first marriage. He fell in love at the first sound of Pauline’s accent, and they’ve been partners ever since, personally and professionally. Pauline and Johnny never had kids, but she was happy being a stepmother to Corran, who was a lovable boy — until he grew up and they started spending more than they had to send him to drug rehab programs. The last straw for Johnny occurred when Corran came for a visit and started using, and Pauline’s wedding ring disappeared. Corran denied stealing it, but Johnny hasn’t spoken to him since.
Now Corran is clean, but he’s also a single father to an infant daughter, Lucy, trying to raise her in a rough, remote Scottish town. After Johnny is diagnosed and scheduled for brain surgery, he suddenly decides to go meet his granddaughter, without consulting Corran or Pauline.
Johnny can’t drive with the possibility of seizures, so (in the midst of that plague of frogs) he enlists as his helper Chemal, the goofy teenage son of his neighbors. Chemal worships KISS, though he wasn’t even born in the band’s heyday, and he dresses for Scottish weather by "layering as many sweatshirts and sweaters as he could under his KISS Army jacket. He looked like a heavy metal marshmallow." Yet Chemal will prove to have unexpected resources.
Pauline, meanwhile, is at home coping with the OSHA investigation and a talkative young lawyer who is combing through the ice house’s records. She has the help of two longtime employees, utterly trustworthy Roy and wisecracking Claire, but both of them are struggling with single parenthood as well.
Smith weaves their stories expertly, moving from Jacksonville to Scotland and back, from another disaster to a laugh-out-loud moment. Her tenderness toward her characters and subtle understanding of class differences in American society are reminiscent of such novelists as Richard Russo and Jennifer Egan, but this heartbreaking, heartwarming novel is an original.
Contact Colette Bancroft at cbancroft@tampabay.com or (727) 893-8435. Follow @colettemb.
The Ice House
By Laura Lee Smith
Grove Press, 448 pages, $25
Times Festival of Reading
Laura Lee Smith will be a featured author at the 2017 Tampa Bay Times Festival of Reading on Nov. 11 at the University of South Florida St. Petersburg. She will speak at 1 p.m. in the Poynter Institute Haiman Amphitheater.