First published 2015
Stuart Stevens turns sixty and faces a harsh reality. He has barely spent time with his ninety-five-year-old father in decades. After enduring a crushing presidential campaign defeat in 2012, Stevens makes a decision. He will return to his native Mississippi for an entire football season. Father and son will attend Ole Miss Rebels games together, just as they did when Stevens was a child navigating the troubled South. They drive to stadiums and cheer from the stands. Between games, they examine their complicated relationship and their separate lives. The football season becomes a journey through memory and reconciliation. Stevens discovers that some bonds, however strained by time and distance, remain precious and irreplaceable. This autumn gives them a final chance to understand each other before it becomes too late.
Genres: family-life, american, biography-memoir, 21st-century
Vibes: emotional-atmospheric, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: coming-of-age, found-family
Setting: Mississippi, South
Period: 2012
Audio CD · Blackstone Publishing