My New Novel

For those of you interested, my new novel, Gray Baby, is now finished and will be released in the spring of 2009, again by Houghton Mifflin. Once I get the cover mock-up, I'll post it here. I'll say right up front that it's a much different story than The Hanging Woods. It isn't as dark, though there are still some disturbing things that take place (and if you pay close attention, you might just see some references to The Hanging Woods, though I must stress that this isn't a sequel.) It opens with Clifton Carlson, who witnesses a troubling incident between his father (who is black) and two white police officers. From there, the story follows Clifton (who is bi-racial) as he struggles to cope with not only what he's witnessed, but also his own identity as he fights the difficulties of adolescence. He becomes friends with an intriguing, elderly white man, Swamper, in the most unlikely of circumstances, and it is through this relationship (and also because of a violent and troubling mystery that the two become involved with) that Clifton changes. But he isn't the only one who is developing and growing. Though Clifton learns a lot about life from Swamper, the elderly man--who has always been set in his ways--realizes that he isn't too old (or too proud) to evolve as well.

The story is set in the 1980's along the banks of the New River in a rural Virginia town called Crocket's Mill. It is a mystery of sorts, but also a story of overcoming obstacles and learning about the trials and tribulations of what it takes to become a "man."

The Horn Book Review

Here's a nice review of The Hanging Woods


THE HORN BOOK Magazine
July / August 2008


Scott Loring Sanders The Hanging Woods
326 pp. Houghton 3/08 isbn 978-0-618-88125-3 $16.00

You’re probably familiar with the idyllic boyhood coming-of-age story, full of friendship, mischief, and nostalgia. But Sanders’s debut novel is also an excellent example of Southern Gothic, and the heady, macabre mix of secrets and violence is evident from the opening lines: “In 1975, when I was thirteen, I killed a fox. It happened a few weeks after I’d snuck into my mother’s room and read her diary.” In a leisurely but compelling voice, Walter chronicles his friendship with Jimmy and Mothball and their assorted adventures: camping, doorbell ditching, gossiping, smoking, stealing, and swimming—not to mention Mothball’s quest to enter The Guinness Book of World Records with the longest-living decapitated turkey. But another story gradually emerges, a tangled web of jealousy, betrayal, and deceit that entraps the boys, their parents, and this small Alabama town. Eventually Walter discloses his mother’s dark secret, and several of his own, but one final bombshell casts his actions in an especially tragic light. This suspenseful story with its flawed but sympathetic characters and brooding atmosphere marks Sanders as a writer to watch. j.h.