The Heart of a Distant Forest [Paperback]

Philip Lee Williams (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 12, 2005

Retired professor Andrew Lachlan has returned to his family home on a lake in central Georgia to die. And yet he has never felt so alive, so ready to learn about the natural world around him. Having taught all his life, he is ready for solitude. But a young country boy, Willie Sullivan, disrupts Lachlan’s search for order and rekindles memories he thought long dead.

Lachlan also finds Callie McKenzie, a woman he loved years earlier, and they soon begin to see in each other reflections of the lives they once led. Lachlan’s journal of his year by the lake leads him to a deeper understanding of himself and the world.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Williams's The Heart of a Distant Forest is, quite simply, one of the finest works of fiction in the history of Georgia literature—a lyrical, tender story of a man who rediscovers his life on his journey to death. Williams's writing is more than masterful storytelling; it is word—art. The South has few writers his equal."--Terry Kay, author of The Valley of Light

“It is precisely because Lachlan is not a larger-than-life character that we come to care and find ourselves moving eagerly with him from one day to the next."--New York Times Book Review

"An auspicious talent . . . Williams handles his heavily weighted theme adroitly, never overstepping into sentimentality. His writing is colorful, knowledgeable, taut. . . . An unexpectedly rich reading experience.”--Fort Worth News-Tribune

"The Heart of a Distant Forest is like Shadow Pond, where Lachlan lives: natural, nourishing, quiet, and turbulent, inviting, and—in places—deep. Test it for yourself."--Knoxville News-Sentinel

"One sentence into the book and you've got lyric poetry; 'Morning is rising in silence.' Lovely. It gets even better with passages you underline for sheer beauty, delight, and wisdom. Between these pages rests some of the best writing I've come across since Alice Walker's The Color Purple, but in a very quiet and very different way and life and tone.”--Columbia State

"Despite its somber undertones, the novel resonates with a deeper joy and optimism. . . . An elegantly moving portrait of life's dignity, even at death."--Booklist

"Williams has a particular gift for creating beautiful imagery that encompasses not only a particular scene, but also the emotions associated with it. The Heart of a Distant Forest is, in short, a beautifully written work by a talented Southern author."--Spartanburg Herald-Journal

About the Author

Philip Lee Williams is the author of fourteen books, including The True and Authentic History of Jenny Dorset (Georgia) and a volume of poetry, Elegies for the Water. His most recent novel is The Campfire Boys. He is a winner of many literary awards and a Georgia Governor’s Award in the Humanities and will be inducted into the Georgia Writers Hall of Fame in 2010. He lives with his family in Oconee County, Georgia.

Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: University of Georgia Press (September 12, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0820327905
• ISBN-13: 978-0820327907
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.2 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,164,954 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Philip Lee Williams is the author of 16 published books, including 11 novels, three works of non-fiction, and two volumes of poetry. His books have been published by such presses as St. Martin's, W. W. Norton, Random House, Grove Press, Ballantine, Dell, Viking/Penguin, and Mercer University Press, as well a number of other smaller and university presses.

His 1000-page novel, The Divine Comics, was published in November 2011 by Mercer University Press. This book is a modern re-imagining and updating of Dante's fabled Divine Comedy. Another novel, Emerson's Brother, will come out in May 2012.

The University of Georgia Press republished his Michael Shaara Prize-winning novel A Distant Flame on April 1, 2011.

Williams's The Flower Seeker: An Epic Poem of William Bartram, came out on Sept. 1, 2010. It was named Book of the Year by Books & Culture Magazine. His most recent novel is The Campfire Boys, fiction about entertainers during the American Civil War. A collection of poetry called Elegies for the Water (Mercer University Press) came out on March 1, 2009.

In May 2007, he received the Governor's Award in the Humanities from the State of Georgia during ceremonies in Atlanta, and in June of that year he was for the second time named Georgia Author of the Year, this time in the essay category in a program at Kennesaw State University. He has since been named Georgia Author of the Year twice more.

His most recent nonfiction book, nature essays called In the Morning: Reflections Toward First Light, came out in the fall of 2006 from Mercer University Press. He is a featured author in a textbook about Georgia authors for the state's eighth graders that was released in the fall of 2008.

His novel A Distant Flame was published by St. Martin's Press in September 2004. In April 2005, it was named winner of the Michael Shaara Award as the best Civil War novel published in the United States in 2004. Williams received the award in Boston in June 2005. The book was also named, by The Georgia Center for the Book, one of 25 books that "All Georgians Should Read." It came out in a trade paperback edition in November 2005.

His first novel, The Heart of a Distant Forest, was reprinted in September 2005 by the University of Georgia Press.

His books have been translated into Swedish, German, French, and Japanese and have appeared in large-print editions as well. A number of his books have been optioned for film by such people as producer Richard Zanuck, director Ron Howard, and actress Meg Ryan. He was hired by M-G-M to write the screenplay of his own book, All the Western Stars, though the movie has not yet been made.

Two of Williams's unpublished manuscripts have also been optioned by producers in Hollywood.

Williams has also published poetry in more than 40 magazines, including Poetry, Press, Karamu, the Cumberland Poetry Review and many others. He has published essays and short stories, and one story, "An Early Snow," published in 2000, was nominated by The Chattahoochee Review for a Pushcart Prize.

An essay of Williams's appeared in the fall 2010 issue of The Georgia Review.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Uncannily Accurate and Compelling Character Study, October 2, 2001

By 

Dr. Christopher Coleman (HONG KONG) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Heart of a Distant Forest: A Novel (Modern Sthrn Clssc) (Paperback)

Having grown up not 50 miles from the setting of the Heart of a Distant Forest, I recognized the reality of the characters immediately. Philip Lee Williams' debut novel is a deeply insightful tale of a search for meaning at life's closing. The protagonist, Andrew Lachlan, is drawn with the finest pen, a beautifully captured representative of the academic Southern Gentleman. Lachlan finds himself betrayed by a body whose physical strength had been so important and perhaps more importantly, torn between a conservative heart and a liberal mind. Seeking acceptance and understanding of his life he retires to contemplate the end of his days in solitude. The novel is told as Lachlan's journal and is primarily a character study of this contradictory man, caught between his need for an almost paralyzing self-analysis and a desire to embrace life without regard for the consequences. Fear and love, intimacy and reserve, all do quiet battle for Lachlan's soul.

5.0 out of 5 stars A final year, a renewed life, August 19, 2008

By 

William Timothy Lukeman - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Heart of a Distant Forest (Paperback)

Andrew Lachlan, retired history professor & widower, has been given roughly a year to live. He begins a journal while living in his childhood home in North Carolina, hoping to eventually make some sense of his life & impending death. What he experiences is far more than he expected, with the world intruding on his solitude & insisting upon his involvement. Love, passion, grief, parental & human obligation all disrupt his life ... but they also enrich it.

There isn't much more to say about the plot. Better to enter into this thoughtful but haunted man's life, day by day, experiencing the subtle beauties of Nature, the troubling & irresistible knots of human relationship, the wrestling with ghosts & intangible doubts. But don't be afraid that it all might be a little too solemn, even too grim! While there's plenty of quiet drama, there's also humor & joy in these pages.

So, what about that hope of making sense of life & death? It's not quite that neat & tidy, with several threads left undone as the final pages approach. But Andrew does come to a deeper understanding of his life & of himself. Never maudlin, composed with a sure & understated hand, this is a superb novel. Most highly recommended!