Book: Nashville Chrome by Rick Bass

Maxine, Jim Ed and Bonnie Brown were siblings who grew up in Arkansas in the mid 20th century. They became famous as country singers.

"The Browns' voices were shiny and elegant, and utterly controlled; the spirit of their voices had the Appalachian hillbilly music as its rootstock, but without the nasal whine and twang. People had never heard anything like it and could not get enough of it. Every song the Browns released in 1955 and 1956 hit the top ten. Never in the history of music has any group had as many Top Ten hits over a two-year period, nor as many number ones."

Rick Bass has written this novel about Browns and their family, their mother Birdie, their father Floyd. It is a fictionalized account of their lives, often returning to Maxine, now a lonely and elderly woman who remembers it all and who still hopes she will grace a stage again.

"That the fame has been gone fifty years now does not register in her. In her mind it has only been gone one day." Finally, she settles for putting up a notice at her local Piggly Wiggly asking if someone would like to make a movie of her life. And someone responds.

Elvis is a minor character and Chet Atkins becomes their manager. The Beatles become famous; musical tastes change and the Browns, for all their talent and success, are forgotten and dismissed. Jim Ed and Bonnie let it all go without much regret, but Maxine is tenacious in her hopes of a reprise of their fame. She has a hard life with an unhappy marriage and too much alcohol, and she never really lets go. Some can and some cannot.

Rick Bass almost always has written of the West or of the natural world, so this book was a surprise. He has lovely memorable scenes all through the story, as when Bonnie's husband-to-be, Brownie, comes to meet the family one snowy evening, or when Elvis and Bonnie take a canoe trip down the river, or when Maxine makes a carefully negotiated trip to the grocery store and it is almost more than she can manage in her frail state.

It is a also the story of a family struggling through adversity and celebrating when things ease in the small towns and hills and woods of Arkansas...the household tasks and homemade cooking, the hard and dangerous work of running a lumber mill, the bonds of family through the years, moonshine and Floyd's drinking, the long road trips when they are out performing and always the comfort of returning home.

So, for a glimpse into the country music scene just before the huge impact of rock-and-roll and technology, this is a sweet, often poignant remembrance.

www.themaxinebrown. com