| |
I’m writing from Donald W. Reynolds Razorback Stadium.
The Cranor Crew loaded up this morning and made the drive from Russellville to Fayetteville for the kid’s first Hogs’ game.
The last time I was in this stadium, Clint Stoerner was the quarterback. I was ten, maybe eleven, years old. I don’t remember much from the game. It was cold and loud, just like it is now, over twenty years later.
We bought my son a hat that’s shaped like a razorback but not the big plastic kind. This one is more like a beanie, like the winter hat Cousin Eddie wears in “National Lampoons: Christmas Vacation,” except my son’s is red and made to resemble the University of Arkansas’s mascot.
My daughter chose pom poms, which she hasn’t stopped shaking since we sat down. She’s bound and determined to get on the Jumbotron.
The hat and the pom poms ran me a smooth seventy bucks. A beer, a seltzer, and two Mello Yellos cost another forty. But, hey, we got the tickets and the parking pass comped (much love and many thanks to our bighearted benefactor). Now, all that’s left for us to do is enjoy the game.
Despite the fact that the Hogs are getting stomped by Mizzou, I still get to see Rick Jones, a dear friend and coaching mentor. Jacolby Criswell, who was a student/player when I was at Morrilton High School, is down on the field too, playing his heart out.
When it’s time for us to go, my son is still wearing his hat, and my daughter's still shaking her pom poms. Even though she didn’t make it on the big screen, she never lost hope. She never stopped cheering.
On the dark ride back home to Russellville, my kids talk endlessly about their big day, recounting all the new sights and sounds. Their excitement takes me back to that game twenty-some-odd years ago when I watched Clint Stoerner dish dimes to Anthony Lucas. I remember coming home and drawing sideburns and a chin beard on my cheeks and chin, imitating the Razorback quarterback I’d just watched play.
My son’s too young for sideburns, or stubble of any sort. At this point, I’m not even sure he knows what a quarterback is, or if he’s aware that his daddy used to toss a pigskin around too. I do know he had fun. A whole day’s worth, spent with his big sister, his mom and dad.
I glance up in the rearview mirror. My daughter is lost in her tablet, my son asleep in his car seat beside her. At first, I think he’s finally ditched the Hog hat — it’s not on his head — but then I spot it in his arms, snugged up tight under his chin.
As my eyes fall back to the road, I wonder what he’s dreaming.
| Books authored by Eli Cranor |
Broiler
Buy the Book
Commissions earned
The troubles of two desperate families—one white, one Mexican American—converge rest in the ruthless underworld of an Arkansas chicken processing plant in this new thriller from the award-winning author of DON’T KNOW TOUGH.
Gabriela Menchaca and Edwin Saucedo are hardworking, undocumented employees at the Detmer Foods chicken plant in Springdale, Arkansas, just a stone’s throw away from the trailer park where they’ve lived together for seven years. While dealing with personal tragedies of their own, the young couple endures the brutal, dehumanizing conditions at the plant in exchange for barebones pay.
When the plant manager, Luke Jackson, fires Edwin to set an example for the rest of the workers—and to show the higher-ups that he’s ready for a major promotion—Edwin is determined to get revenge on Luke and his wife, Mimi, a new mother who stays at home with her six-month-old son. Edwin’s impulsive action sets in motion a devastating chain of events that illuminates the deeply entrenched power dynamics between those who revel at the top and those who toil at the bottom.
From the nationally bestselling and Edgar Award–winning author of Don’t Know Tough and Ozark Dogs comes another edge-of-your-seat noir thriller that exposes the dark, bloody heart of life on the margins in the American South and the bleak underside of a bygone American Dream. |
Don't Know Tough
Buy the Book
Commissions earned
In Denton, Arkansas, the fate of the high school football team rests on the shoulders of Billy Lowe, a volatile but talented running back. Billy comes from an extremely troubled home: a trailer park where he is terrorized by his mother’s abusive boyfriend. Billy takes out his anger on the field, but when his savagery crosses a line, he faces suspension.
Without Billy Lowe, the Denton Pirates can kiss their playoff bid goodbye. But the head coach, Trent Powers, who just moved from California with his wife and two children for this job, has more than just his paycheck riding on Billy’s bad behavior. As a born-again Christian, Trent feels a divine calling to save Billy—save him from his circumstances, and save his soul.
Then Billy’s abuser is found murdered in the Lowe family trailer, and all evidence points toward Billy. Now nothing can stop an explosive chain of violence that could tear the whole town apart on the eve of the playoffs. |
Ozark Dogs
Buy the Book
Commissions earned
In this Southern thriller, two families grapple with the aftermath of a murder in their small Arkansas town.
After his son is convicted of capital murder, Vietnam War veteran Jeremiah Fitzjurls takes over the care of his granddaughter, Joanna, raising her with as much warmth as can be found in an Ozark junkyard outfitted to be an armory. He teaches her how to shoot and fight, but there is not enough training in the world to protect her when the dreaded Ledfords, notorious meth dealers and fanatical white supremacists, come to collect on Joanna as payment for a long-overdue blood debt.
Headed by rancorous patriarch Bunn and smooth-talking, erudite Evail, the Ledfords have never forgotten what the Fitzjurls family did to them, and they will not be satisfied until they have taken an eye for an eye. As they seek revenge, and as Jeremiah desperately searches for his granddaughter, their narratives collide in this immersive story about family and how far some will go to honor, defend—or in some cases, destroy it. |
| Previous columns: |
• Writing From: The End
• Writing from Oyster Island
• Writing from Jayne Lemons
• Writing from Bed
• Writing from Witherspoon Hall
• Writing From: Coco
• Writing from the Beach
• Writing From: Crooked Creek
• Writing from a Nursing Home
• Writing from a Firework Tent
• Writing from a Boat
• Writing from the Stars
• Writing from the Pool
• Writing from the Kitchen
• Writing from Summer
• Writing from Kindergarten
• Writing from Mom
• Writing from a Plane
• Writing from Home
• My second novel’s publication
• A New Marriage Milestone
• An Invitation to the Party
• Writing from a Thunderstorm
• Writing from a Soundbooth
• Writing from “Jazz Beach"
• Writing from the Sabbath
• Writing from somewhere between Little Rock and Russellville
|
• Writing from my back deck
• Writing from the morning of my thirty-fifth year
• Writing on the day of the college football National Championship
• Writing from the space between breaths
• Writing from 2022
• Writing from the glow of a plastic Christmas tree
• Writing on a rollercoaster of triumph and disaster
• Writing from the drop-off line at my daughter’s elementary school
• Writing with Thanksgiving on my mind
• Writing from the crowd before the start of a Shovels & Rope show
• Writing from the depths of a post-book-festival hangover
• Writing from the Ron Robinson Theatre
• Writing to you on Halloween Eve
• Writing from my bed on a Saturday morning
• Writing from my office with two darts clenched in my left hand
• Writing from the shade of my favorite tree
• Writing from my desk on a Tuesday morning
• Writing from a pirate ship
• Writing from the airport
• Writing from the hospital
• I'm writing from the water
• Writing from my wife's Honda Pilot
• Writing from my office |
|
