Louisiana Power & Light (1994)

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A favorite novel by “a generous and lyric storyteller” (San Francisco Chronicle) known for his tragicomic voice and unforgettable characters.

Welcome to Monroe, Louisiana, corrugated paper capital of the North Delta parishes, home of the Louisiana Passion Play and the Christian business weekly Prophet and Loss, a city whose library hosts a dysfunctional Great Books seminar, whose civil theater has produced a musical-comedy version of King Lear, and whose cypress tress have been known to drip snakes.
Folks here have been studying the genetically deficient Fontana family for generations, ever since Peregrine Fontana sloshed his way out of the swamp in 1840. Now it's 1972 and Billy Wayne Fontana is the last survivor of this sorry familial line.

In this hilarious and wholly original tragi-comic romp you'll meet Billy Wayne, who has been raised and groomed for the priesthood but who leaves his spiritual calling for Earlene, a sassy woman who writes country music lyrics at her kitchen table; George Binwaddie, a Pakistani messiah and motel owner who is driven to extraordinary acts of violence; Angelo Candella, a Vietnam hero and State House official who runs his office from a wheelchair; and Moon Pie Fontana, Billy Wayne's offspring, a physically disabled child-star radio evangelist. Hold on, this is a wild and wacky ride through the Louisiana backwaters.

"This was my first Dufresne book. The characters are rich, unique, and, if they're a bit out of the ordinary, no problem, they're from the south, where unusual characters are accepted by everyone. The main characters all want what most of us want -- a family, a job, a community, stability -- and it's in the telling of how they achieve or fail to achieve these goals that makes the characters so rich and complex. Another fine example of characters made into real people by Dufresne's skills and a book you will not soon forget. It's also a mesmerizing portrait of a southern small community, wherein it is widely acceptable to be a little odd, so we have no problems with that."
- Amazon.com Reviewer