Postscript for Cataloochee - Read the Book

Between my visit to Cataloochee last fall and my latest visit in May I read the novel "Cataloochee" by Wayne Caldwell, a native of nearby Waynesville. This is Caldwell's first novel. It has been compared to "Cold Mountain" and includes a blurb by Charles Frazier on the book jacket. Similarities abound, but I found "Cataloochee" to be an entrancing story in its own right, weaving families together through generations and hard times, and in walking the mountains and meadows of the present day I felt constant chills as I pictured characters and homesteads. I realized that my ability to come to this place was a direct result of the residents having to leave it. The book ends (although a sequel is coming) as the government is buying the land for the national park, and although this is not the focus of the book, the feeling of endings is palpable. In conversation with one of the park volunteers as we were watching the "elk show" one evening, I asked her if she had read "Cataloochee." She smiled and said indeed she had, that she thought it was a fascinating book, and many locals who have read it feel they know which fictional characters are based on real residents of days past. She also shared that some descendants who come back for the annual reunions feel that losing the land to the park also saved it: it did not become just another commercially developed community and its preservation has been a blessing. I don't know that all the families feel that way, but I am selfishly grateful. I highly recommend this book, especially if you are planning a visit to Cataloochee. The story moves back and forth in time and you have to concentrate to keep the events in order, but that's just the way I like a good story - make me work for it and keep turning the pages to witness the cliffhangers. Hint: Watch out for heavy objects falling...