The Kings and Queens of Roam

The fifth novel from Wallace (Big Fish) is an imaginative, sentimental modern-day tall tale. Its setting, the village of Roam (quite possibly in the Appalachian Mountains), is centered on a once-thriving silk factory established by the local patriarch, Elijah McCallister, after he returned from China with silk worms as his cargo and a young silk merchant, Ming Kai, as his prisoner. One hundred years later, Elijah’s teenaged great-granddaughters Helen and Rachel are left to fend for themselves after their parents die in a freak auto crash. The eldest, Helen, cursed with a face “ugly from the day she was born,” deceives the blind Rachel into thinking herself the homely one, never telling her she has “the face of an angel.” The difficulties of the sisters’ relationship climax with Helen abandoning Rachel, who in her agitation flees into the surrounding forest. Meanwhile, ghosts from decrepit Roam’s glory days mingle with its current residents, including diminutive tavern owner Digby Chang. Throw a lonely but helpful lumberjack named Mr. Smith into the mix, along with a magical river, and Wallace’s far-fetched, rollicking yarn, written in the vein of Manly Wade Wellman and Fred Chappell, consistently engages the reader. Agent: Gray Tan, the Grayhawk Agency. (May)