A World Made of Fire Author:Mark Childress A World Made of Fire is set in Alabama at the turn of the century and tells the story of the large-hearted Callie Bates and her adoring children; Callie, who married a Bates like herself but from the far end of the same proud line (a great-aunt arranged it -- he was fifty, a preacher and alone, and Callie had her own young shame to put ... more »right). It is the story of the preacher-husband leaving in a buggy after the wedding and returning twice a year with money and spiteful sermons about the children Callie gives birth to year after year in his absence. It is the story of the secret visitor who is the radiant element of Callie's life; of the tragic Christmas Day of 1901; and of the children who survive it -- Jacko, believed to have magical powers because he was saved from the fire in his mother's arms, and young Stella, blighted by the sorrow she has witness and outlived, struggling to open out once again to the comforts and risks of love. And it is the story of the canny old woman who enters Stella's life with tales of powers unseen.
A World Made of Fire is a novel of place, of emotional subtlety and suspense, of mysteries resolved, and of life affirmed. It marks the debut of an immensely gifted novelist.« less
Set in rural Alabama before WWI,this book probes varieties of love and tenderness from the viewpoint of a young girl, whose literary forebearers include Lena Grove in Faulkner's LIGHT IN AUGUST.