Ellen Birkett Morris’s Beware the Tall Grass
Love, Integrity, and Courage: A Review, and Interview with Beware the Tall Grass author Ellen Birkett Morris by John David Morgan
In Beware the Tall Grass, winner of the 2024 Donald L. Jordan Literary Prize from Columbus State University Press, debut novelist Ellen Birkett Morris explores the question of what happens when the life you get, isn’t the life you’d hope you’d get. Jordan Prize judge Lan Samantha Chang says of the book, “in this beautiful novel, two stories separated by half a century intertwine to create an indelible narrative of peace of war … through surprising and suspenseful turns, Beware the Tall Grass explores the evocative mysteries of time and memory.”
Morris is the author of Lost Girls: Short Stories (reviewed in Miracle Monocle, Issue 19), winner of the Pencraft Award, and the poetry chapbooks Surrender and Abide. Her fiction has appeared in Shenandoah, Antioch Review, Notre Dame Review, and South Carolina Review, among other journals. She's a recipient of an Al Smith Fellowship from the Kentucky Arts Council, and her essays have appeared in Newsweek, AARP’s The Ethel, Oh Reader magazine, and on National Public Radio. Morris holds an MFA from Queens University-Charolotte and lives in Louisville, Kentucky.
Inspiration for what was first a short story titled “Landing Zone Albany” came from a 2014 road trip taken by Ellen and her husband, during which they heard a story about children with past life memories on National Public Radio. The story centered on a research program at the University of Virginia and the work of neuroscientists who explored the phenomena of young children with past life memories and attempted to verify the children’s claims by checking them against reportage from the time. The scientists have investigated over 2,500 such cases, primarily in children ages three to eight years old.
Morris describes the process of expanding her short story into a novel as “chipping away at a mountain with nail scissors.” She knew how to tell the story of Eve the mother, but to expand her short story to novel length, she needed a second POV. She decided the way to go was with a solider character, Thomas. The structure of the book is one chapter about Eve and her son Charlie and his, what she comes to suspect, past life memories, followed by a chapter about Thomas, the soldier. Thomas grows up on a ranch in Montana. He impetuously joins the Army after graduating high school, and is tested by what he finds in Vietnam.
The book opens with the birth of Eve’s son: “Charlie was here. For a moment, my connection with him was visible … the nurse handed Charlie to me. I ran my fingers across his small hands. I unwrapped the blanket and rubbed his small belly.” The next chapter introduces Thomas to the reader: “On a late afternoon in April, I took (my horse) beau to round up cattle. We were making our way through tall grass when an eastern racer slithered across our path … the world was quiet. I heard my own breathing. Beau was gone. Tears dropped onto my hands as I stroked him one last time. Beware the tall grass, nothing good ever happens there.”
Morris’ first published works were poetry chapbooks. She aspires to write with the sparsity of Hemingway, and the empathy of Elizabeth Strout. An example of that sparse but empathetic writing is Eve contemplating her child Charlie, not long after Eve and her husband Dan bring Charlie home from the hospital: “I had a fantasy that I could give him an ideal childhood, one that would make up for my own crazy upbringing, as if I could somehow fix the past. As if he were made of clay and ready for molding instead of a mysterious mix of blood, bones, and psyche.”
By the age of four, Charlie has turned into a very mysterious mix:
“Who are you today?”
“Fireman.”
“What are you putting out?”
“Tree. Napalm got it.”
Eve, naturally concerned, exhausts the traditional behavioral and brain-scan medical solutions, before ultimately turning to a past-life expert. That process creates tension between Eve and Dan, who is burdened by the history of his mother, who lost everything she had to false psychics.
Morris wrote Beware the Tall Grass when her mother was diagnosed with lung cancer, and she was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis. An essay about that experience: “Improvising My Way Through Loss,” was published in Miracle Monocle Issue 19, Fall 2022. Having watched her mother in her battle against cancer, the battle metaphor echoes with both Eve and Thomas. The theme of motherhood is a recurring one:
“It’s hard when they forget, especially when it’s your momma.” She (the nurse) placed her hand on my shoulder.”
“It is,” I said. “Why do you think it’s so much harder when it’s your mom who is fading?”
“Because they’re the only ones who know you from the very start. They know your whole story. At least their version of it.”
There are also intriguing secondary characters and sub-plots. Amy, for example, is a friend of Eve’s who experiences domestic violence. Helping Amy is a test for how Eve can help her son. Throughout the book, there's a wonderful continuity between the Eve and Thomas sections. The book becomes the twin narratives of a mother’s advocacy, and a soldier’s courage. I found clear connections between the different sections; a parallel path that pulled me through the trials of motherhood, the aspirations of a perfect childhood, and a young man going to war, figuring out who he is.
I was recently fortunate enough to connect with Morris. The following is a transcript of our conversation, lightly edited and condensed for length and clarity:
You have said in previous interviews that Beware the Tall Grass was originally a short story that you expanded into a novel. Can you talk a little about that process; what were some of the milestones?
EBM: Milestone number one was deciding to turn the short story into a novel. Milestone number two was figuring out who the Point of View characters would, so I could have the story of a family but also the story of a solider. The other real challenge for me was how to interconnect those two stories. Fleshing the story out fully was another challenge for me. And that’s something I did with the help of my writer’s group, with the help of the Association of Writers and Writers Programs (AWP) mentorship program, and finally with the help of a development editor that I got through the New York Book Editors. I got an agent, and that was a huge milestone. He sent the book out, but he really wasn’t doing his due diligence, and when I heard he had been forced to resign from the Agents and Editors professional organization, I decided to cease that relationship.
Wow. Without naming names, can you elaborate on that bad Agent experience?
EBM: The agent took the words from my query letter, put those exact words in his pitch letter, he didn’t refine it, he didn’t make it any better. He didn’t give me any suggestions for improvement with the book. No edits at all. He sent it out to a lot of people, and never got back to me about the progress or status. So clearly, he was not doing his job. He got called out for not doing his job.
That’s unfortunate. So how did you shift gears after dropping your agent?
EBM: I realized, there are enough wonderful small presses that I can find a home for this book, so I decided to go that route. And, when I came across the Donald J. Jordan prize, I had just written a story about love, and integrity, and courage, and their guidelines ask for uniquely American stories that deal with issues of integrity. So I thought, this is a perfect fit, and that’s when I knew, this was a match.
I’ve read that you were thinking the novel might not be good enough to be published, when you were notified that you were a finalist for the Donald L. Jordan prize. So is if fair to say that news came at just the right time?
EBM: Exactly the right time. Before that contact, I had the thought, is this really any good? And every writer feels that way at one time or another about their work. I was delighted when I heard from them the book was a finalist, then even more delighted when they contacted me with the news that my book had won!
Where do your characters come from? And I’m curious, how many of your characters are from your husband Bud?
EBM: My mother was a fierce advocate for me, and for herself, and for many people. She was a nurse. So Eve has a lot of my Mom in there. But Bud! Boy. Well Dan, he is a logical, lovely person, who cares for his family, but because of his past experiences, he tends to see things through his own lens for a while. My husband Bud the statistician is also logical, loving, very smart, and a fundamentally decent person.
A lot of Bud, here. What about this? What about your secondary characters? What role do they play?
EBM: There are also elements of Bud in Thomas’ fellow soldier Dumbo, who is always happy, but also smart, someone who loves music and sings often. In terms of Dumbo, I needed a character for comic relief, someoneThomas could direct his love and affection toward after the loss of his horse Beau. And Dumbo was that character.
Do you have any comments about marketing to share with our readers, some of whom are aspiring writers?
EBM: I have a publicist through Columbus State University, and that’s fantastic. But, part of the job of marketing is get “earned media,” which is trying to newspaper and radio stations, and television stations interested in your project. And it’s very tough to do. I sent pitches to the local Public Radio station, since my book was inspired by an NPR broadcast, and they didn’t pick it up in advance of the book’s release. It’s tough to get the attention of the media. So you put yourself out there. There are podcasts, there are book bloggers, there are people uniquely interested in the world of literature, so you pitch to them as a way to get your work out there.
Did your publisher ask you to provide your Facebook stats, the number of your followers, things like that?
EBM: No. They wanted the handles to tag me, but didn’t ask what following I had. So, my advice for aspiring authors is to friend other writers; follow other writers, support other writers. Being connected in that way is a key in today’s writing world.
Last question. This is one from the book signing you did recently at the Carnegie Book Store, hosted by UofL’s own Ian Stansel. The question was about writing style, and whether you are an architect, someone who plans out a book in detail, or a gardener, one who plants a seed and lets it grow?
EBM: I'm a gardener. I feel like the initial idea for a story is like a seed. You need to sit with it, see where it takes you, see how it spreads, where it sprouts. You need to cultivate it, and feed that initial idea to make it bigger, make it more interesting. To extend the gardening metaphor, add branches. At the same time, I do think every novelist has at least a little of the architect in them. Because once you have grown the story, you then have to figure out how to keep the story interesting; how to make the pacing right, what to cut, how to change the voices, what paths these people are going to take. So, you can’t totally be one or the other. I think it takes both. *
After finishing Beware the Tall Grass, will the reader be convinced some children do experience past life memories? Maybe; maybe not. As Eve says near the end of the book, “these things are unknowable.” Regardless, will the reader relish in the rewards of experiencing a story well-told? Yes. No question about that.