The Review of Contemporary Fiction
Kentuckiana by Johnny PayneRobert Headley
Johnny Payne. Kentuckiana. TriQuarterly/Northwestern Univ. Press, 1997. 255 pp. $24.95.
Kentuckiana is fiction writer and playwright Johnny Payne’s second novel, and it is a finely written, completely entertaining work, indeed. Set in Lexington, Kentucky (specifically, in the subdivision of Garden Springs), Kentuckiana is the bizarre story of a real-estate developer and his son, Junior, an unlikely pair of storytellers whose weird cast of characters, the Miles family, literally come to life. In fact, the Miles family proves to be so realistic and so powerful that their respective voices quickly seize control of the novel’s narrative, and the monologues of the developer and Junior become the bookends, the first and the final chapters of Payne’s metafictional tale of family life in suburbia in the 1960s and ’70s. Six of the seven Mileses take a turn at telling about their wild, unpredictable, and thoroughly dysfunctional family—the seventh manages to capture the heart of Junior—progressively blurring the line between their own imaginary existence and the reality of the real estate developer’s attempt to report on his brainchild, the Garden Springs subdivision. Their respective monologues reveal a family trying hard to avoid the label “redneck,” while confronting the evils of alcohol and drug abuse, free love, feuds, self-doubt, picky squabbles, teenage angst, love, duty, and much, much more. Kentuckiana is a funny, funny book that scratches at the surface of suburbia . . . and draws blood. Payne’s writing is smooth and artful; each chapter is characterized by a distinct prose style and a unique narrative voice that resonates with charm and truth. This fanciful, sometimes hilarious portrait of working-class life in Kentucky is witty, ironic, and completely engaging. Kentuckiana deserves to be read. [Robert Headley]