Beautifully written novel is stuck in the past

Set in Kentucky during the 1980s, CE Morgan’s debut novel calls to mind a wealth of great literature, from the Old Testament to Flannery O’Connor to Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre.

All the Living

By CE Morgan

Fourth Estate, €18

Set in Kentucky during the 1980s, CE Morgan’s debut novel calls to mind a wealth of great literature, from the Old Testament to Flannery O’Connor to Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre.

When Orren’s family is wiped out in a car accident, he asks his young lover, Aloma, to come and live with him on the tobacco farm he has inherited. Aloma’s parents died when she ...