Coiled in the Heart

By Scott Elliott

Book Overview

From a bold new Southern voice, a graceful and provocative love story born of guilt and atonement. One day, seven-year-old Tobia Caldwell-the last in a line of proud, if declining, Southern aristocrats-discovers a cottonmouth snake in a creek on the family's shrinking estate. Soon afterward, he meets Ben Wilson, a boy his age, who has moved into one of the first houses in a subdivision going up on what used to be Caldwell land. Imagining he is defending him-self and his creek against a bully and an intruder, Tobia leads Ben into a deadly encounter with the cottonmouth and discovers, with Ben's twin sister, Merritt, the boy's lifeless body facedown in the creek. Years later, Tobia reencounters Merritt-and the bond be-tween them, forged out of their first, immediate experience of death, is electric. As he falls in love with her, Tobia must struggle with the guilty secret of his childhood, and, ultimately, come to terms with the truth of his past. Smart, sophisticated, and luminous, Coiled in the Heartwrestles with the integration of the old and the new, while exploring the force of love; the eccentricities of family; the power of guilt; and the cumbersome, though stabilizing, weight of the past.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0399150382
• ISBN13: 9780399150388
• Release Date: July 2003
• Publisher: G. P. Putnam's Sons
• Length: 293 Pages
• Weight: 0.95 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 6.4" x 9.5"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

An Accidental Reward

This novel came my way in an accidental way. My daughter, a freshman at the time at Western Kentucky University, was invited to read the novel as a part of the "One Book, One Campus, One Community" initiative. She passed it along to me shortly after the event was staged. What an in-your-face reminder of mid-list gems! "Coiled in the Heart" reminds the reader of the serpent lore present in Appalachian studies. Woven through the novel are questions of accountability, culpability and guilt, entertainingly and expertly told. Scott Elliott was billed as a "bold new Southern voice" when the novel was released. Belatedly writing this review is a kick in the pants to see what he's been up to; it's sure to be a worthwhile read that's hopefully taking Elliott beyond mid-list.

Very Good...Possibly Great

This is one of the better books about Old South/New South questions I've read. It's also timely and prescient in its ecological conceit--a father son team tear down and basically recycle cluster mansions in an attempt to return the land to its natural state. The attempt is financed by money earned from an investment in a computer company. The book does an excellent job of raising big questions in elegant prose. It's also filled with wonderful, complex characters (including a cameo from a snapping turtle named Eddie) and some fantastically drawn female characters. The book passes with flying colors the important (for me) literary test of evoking a wide range of complex emotions in almost every scene. In some ways the book reminds me of Gatsby but it also calls to mind some of the work of really good "Southern" writers like Walker Percy, Peter Taylor, and Robert Penn Warren. I could see this being a great addition to a survey of Southern Literature. One of the better contemporary novels I've read (Southern or just American) in some time.

New American classic

Elliott's characters are rich with emotion and detail without being overwrought. Not only is this an entertaining read, but it has something important to say about being human. A must read!

Snakes Alive

The pivotal scene at the river, to name but one highlight, is unforgettable. Elliott is a fine writer.

A Wonderful Read

I knew nothing about this book until I saw it featured in a book review of our Sunday newspaper. I am very glad that I purchased and read this book.This new author has not published some "spy or mystery" novel as so many other authors need to do; rather, he has purlished a wonderful book about conflicts of people, young and old, parents and children, children and children, and man and woman. His descriptons of the places and characters of his book are detailed and wonderful and keep the reader in "visual" contact with the story. The emotions of the characters and the subtle twists of fate are very believable by the reader.This is a wonderful read. It is a great change from the standard and mostly predictable books that are now being published and affords the reader with an enjoyable story and time spent with the characters.It is unfortunate that this novel is a first time book by an unknown author. If it was published by a more famous author it would receive the attention it deserves. I just hope that Mr. Elliott does not attempt to revert to standard story lines in his next book, one that I will be anticipating.