Wingwalkers: A Novel
Apr 2022 · St. Martin's Press
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About this eBook
A former WWI ace pilot and his wingwalker wife barnstorm across Depression-era America, performing acts of aerial daring.
“They were over Georgia somewhere, another nameless hamlet whose dusty streets lay flocked and trembling with the pink handbills they’d rained from the sky that morning, the ones that announced the coming of DELLA THE DARING DEVILETTE, who would DEFY THE HEAVENS, shining like a DAYTIME STAR, a WING-WALKING WONDER borne upon the wings of CAPTAIN ZENO MARIGOLD, a DOUBLE ACE of the GREAT WAR, who had ELEVEN AERIAL VICTORIES over the TRENCHES OF FRANCE.”
Wingwalkers is one-part epic adventure, one-part love story, and, as is the signature for critically-acclaimed author Taylor Brown, one large part American history. The novel braids the adventures of Della and Zeno Marigold, a vagabond couple that funds their journey to the west coast in the middle of the Great Depression by performing death-defying aerial stunts from town to town, together with the life of the author (and thwarted fighter pilot) William Faulkner, whom the couple ultimately inspires during a dramatic air show—with unexpected consequences for all.
Brown has taken a tantalizing tidbit from Faulkner’s real life—an evening's chance encounter with two daredevils in New Orleans—and set it aloft in this fabulous novel. With scintillating prose and an action-packed plot, he has captured the true essence of a bygone era and shed a new light on the heart and motivations of one of America's greatest authors.
“They were over Georgia somewhere, another nameless hamlet whose dusty streets lay flocked and trembling with the pink handbills they’d rained from the sky that morning, the ones that announced the coming of DELLA THE DARING DEVILETTE, who would DEFY THE HEAVENS, shining like a DAYTIME STAR, a WING-WALKING WONDER borne upon the wings of CAPTAIN ZENO MARIGOLD, a DOUBLE ACE of the GREAT WAR, who had ELEVEN AERIAL VICTORIES over the TRENCHES OF FRANCE.”
Wingwalkers is one-part epic adventure, one-part love story, and, as is the signature for critically-acclaimed author Taylor Brown, one large part American history. The novel braids the adventures of Della and Zeno Marigold, a vagabond couple that funds their journey to the west coast in the middle of the Great Depression by performing death-defying aerial stunts from town to town, together with the life of the author (and thwarted fighter pilot) William Faulkner, whom the couple ultimately inspires during a dramatic air show—with unexpected consequences for all.
Brown has taken a tantalizing tidbit from Faulkner’s real life—an evening's chance encounter with two daredevils in New Orleans—and set it aloft in this fabulous novel. With scintillating prose and an action-packed plot, he has captured the true essence of a bygone era and shed a new light on the heart and motivations of one of America's greatest authors.
Ratings and reviews
5.0
1 review
brf1948
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30 April 2022
Taylor Brown is one of the authors I read and read again every few years. He can always bring a smile to my face and peace to my heart. And with every reading, I can find something new I missed. Some mind picture to add to the story in my head. Wingwalkers was a novel I knew I had to have ASAP. And boy, was it worth the wait! Based on a chance meeting on Mayday in 1925 in New Orleans between gypsy stunt flyers and the author William Faulkner, this is a tale to keep you up all night. We will be backtracking history, returning to the age of 'balloonatics' and the Wright brothers and their followers at the turn of the twentieth century. We follow the growth of air travel as it occurred, and several pilots of World War 1 as they travel across America following that war, working in small towns with airplane rides and wing walker thrills into the 1930s. As the Depression bites down, they are lucky to make groceries and fuel for the plane, which burns castor oil, and enough coin to print copies of the fliers of their upcoming acts, which they drop over a town center the night before their afternoon show. Our intrepid wing-walker is Della the Daring Mackintosh, and her husband and pilot Zeno Marigold, who touts himself as a Double Ace of the Great War with eleven aerial victories over the trenches of France. Most nights they sleep under the wing of the plane in some farmer's field, and after the afternoon show they will fly on to the next town, drop fliers, and bed down for the night. They have to find a place to land before dark, so they can check out the landing area. And everywhere they go, everything they do, they are accompanied by Sark, their Scottish Terrier. Della's dream as she wing walks and hangs from the undercarriage and does gymnastics on the fly from hardpoint to hardpoint while in flight is just to make it to Hollywood, which was her mother's dream, as well. She is fairly sure they will make it out of Georgia - eventually. Zeno just hopes the pistons and rings in the old motor of their Curtiss Flying Jenny will hold out until they get far enough south to winter over and rebuild the motor. And then in New Orleans, they will meet author William Faulkner, who has dreams - and secrets - of his own. What a tale!
About the author
TAYLOR BROWN grew up on the Georgia coast. He has lived in Buenos Aires, San Francisco, and the mountains of western North Carolina. He is the recipient of the Montana Prize in Fiction and a finalist for the Southern Book Prize. His novels include Fallen Land, The River of Kings, Gods of Howl Mountain, and Pride of Eden. He lives in Savannah, Georgia.
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