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Lucinda Dixon Sullivan 479 Lucinda Dixon Sullivan from It Was the Goodness of the Place Lucinda Dixon Sullivan, a very talented Kentucky-born latecomer to the high art of writing good fiction, was once a student of Sena Jeter Naslund’s in the Spalding University writing program. In this elegant and sad story of passion, murder, and salvation set in the fully realized towns of Milan and Hickman, you will find an emerging writer who has already written a book of epic dimensions that most veteran writers would envy. Sullivan introduces her two principal protagonists with surcharged sexuality and a confidence and deftness reminiscent of A Long and Happy Life, Reynolds Price’s 1962 debut novel. h The skirted fenders and tank of Gabe Phillips’ new Indian Chief motorcycle were red as apples and glowed like Chinese lacquer. On Gabe’s instruction, Lucy Clement hiked her leg up behind the cycle’s black leather seat that was big as a saddle and clambered over. Gabe pointed to the fold-out kick start pedal so she wouldn’t scrape her leg. But who wouldn’t risk it at the chance for a ride? The Indian Chief’s suspension was so springy that when Lucy mounted, it bounced under her added weight. The thing not only felt alive, it was frisky as a summer pony. Lucy wiggled herself into a comfortable position behind Gabe. Her arms slid forward naturally and latched around him at the waist. She seemed to fit precisely, like the shiny chrome cables and linkages that connected parts to the cycle’s chassis. It was a hot, dry, blue-white July day in 1934, and Lucy didn’t care if she was wearing her best skirt. Sixteen-year-old Lucy would have this adventure no matter what her daddy said. Before she gave Gabe the go-a-head, she pulled her skirt hem down until it all but covered the brown-and-white saddle oxfords which she had only recently scuffed to her satisfaction. The skirt was made of soft, fern green and gray plaid challis, and Lucy set almost as much store by it as Gabe did by his cycle. Besides, if Lucien Clement found out that she was racing around Milan County glued onto Gabe Phillips’ back like “some tacky piece of Boxtown trash,” what Lucy was wearing wouldn’t make her father’s wrath less thunderous or Gabe’s company more suitable in her parents’ eyes. 479 480 The Kentucky Anthology Gabe could hardly get started for bragging to Lucy about the Indian Chief’s particulars. His cheeks were this minute as shiny-apple red as the motorcycle’s paint while he showed off a “mounted shift lever.” What Lucy loved was that Gabe loved it. He was eighteen years old and she, after years of studying Gabe, had never seen his face light up like this. For the first time ever, Gabe seemed simply to have no notion of the fact that his right leg was crippled. They were at a pull-off way out at the end of Rose Hill where Milan started to thin out and blend into the countryside when fields expanded and stretched the houses farther and farther apart until turrets on the old, painted Victorian homes pulled away from their foundations and became silos on the horizon, near the enlarging barns. Lucy’s stomach hitched when all Gabe’s noisy throttling and choking of the engine gave way to motion. But the very next minute they glided off the shoulder and headed down the road, then Lucy eased. Gabe would keep her safe. She could feel his back muscles flex against her chest. He leaned forward into the wind against them and she held tight, bending the reed of herself to the whistling reed of him. They were headed toward the river gorge.The road was narrow but newly paved, one of the few county roads that wasn’t a simple strip of oiled gravel. Lucy looked away to her right. Already there was a backdrop of faraway palisades behind the unrolling fields. Gabe speeded up, gaining on the open country. The wind scrubbed against them hard but was no match for their red engine. It was exhilarating. Her red hair was liquid like the engine. Lucy laughed, head back, and caught cup after cup of warm summer in her mouth and swallowed, spitting out her curls. She and Gabe were flying. The trees were all one stripe of green...

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