Clifton Forge

period and so i wanted to look not only at discrimination against queer people but also against people of color and some of it is very historical you know there's a whole chapter in the book where everything in it happens when i'm describing this white riot that is sort of the impetus for a lot of action in the novel so it's not a book about race or racism or orientation or any of those big social issues I think it's a book about love and people who are in love and face a lot of obstacles because their love has been legislated.

The town I'm from, Clifton Forge, I did not realize until there was a map that I saw on social media about lynchings.

Yeah.

It was probably 10 years ago now.

Four miners were lynched in my hometown in Clifton Forge, and I did not know that until I was in my 30s.

It just blew my mind that that history has been so covered up.

yeah on one hand i was nervous and hesitant to write about race as a white man i i would certainly never want to try to tell somebody else's story or take that from them the last thing i ever want to do is hurt any reader my intention was that i'm writing this story that's set over the course of 20th century and i didn't see a way around tackling racism as well because that was such a part of the story of the region and not only of the region but of the whole country and you know most of the book takes place during the time of jim crow it was just too big a thing to not write about.

Well, I got a story for you.

Um, Gretchen's granddad was her pastor at a little church in Clifton Forge, Virginia.

You've never heard of it.

Never.

Mm

...

in Clifton Forge, Virginia.

Mm.

But I'm not giving up on any votes.

I'm still doing my town halls in small towns, and meeting with farmers and veterans, and, um, we're, we're, we've got a healthcare town hall coming up next week in, in Clifton Forge, which is where those small town scenes in Dopesick was shot, um, to talk about what's it, what's it gonna look like when these Medicaid cuts come down.

We've got a town hall on data centers coming up in Botetourt, because Google is trying to put a triplex of data centers, um, there, which is just north of me here, and is a very Republican stronghold, but we've had some Republicans out door-knocking for me in Botetourt.

So I'm pretty encouraged.