By Alan Govenar
New from writer, photographer, and filmmaker Alan Govenar, Come Round Right is a deeply personal novel and a paean to a pivotal moment in American history—when the Vietnam War was raging, and the idealism of the 1960s was losing ground to frustration, anger, and violence.
Publication Date: May 6, 2025
Hardback: 9781646053742
eBook: 9781646053872
Description
Spring, 1971. Eighteen-year-old Aaron Berg is hitchhiking for his life, trying to come to terms with the sexual assault he and his new girlfriend survived in Canada five months earlier. Determined to reclaim his faith in humanity, Aaron’s harrowing journey through Appalachia reveals newfound joys and an unexpected truth that changes his life.
Lyrical and poetic, juxtaposing Shaker melodies with a twangy sound and a heavy percussive beat, Come Round Right is at once a moving reckoning with the author’s own trauma and an expansive novel that speaks to the most pressing issues of our time.
Biographical Information
Alan Govenar is an award-winning writer, poet, playwright, photographer, and filmmaker. He is director of Documentary Arts, a non-profit organization he founded to advance essential perspectives on historical issues and diverse cultures. Govenar is a Guggenheim Fellow and the author of more than thirty books, including Boccaccio in the Berkshires (2021), Deep Ellum and Central Track (2023) and See That My Grave is Kept Clean (2023), all from Deep Vellum.
Reviews
"Come Round Right is a novel written from the heart. Alan Govenar masterfully juxtaposes small moments and individual stories against the panorama of 1970s American culture. As the relationship between Aaron and Adriana takes its romantic, difficult course, we become immersed in a story where menace, violence, and trauma take center stage. Written with wit, grace, and transcendent compassion, this novel places Alan Govenar squarely in the tradition of Bernard Malamud, Cynthia Ozick, and Saul Bellow." —Jaina Sanga, author of Silk Fish Opium
"Govenar turns the reader into a hitchhiker in this beautiful, often trippy, and intimate exploration of the search for meaning when innocence is lost. Amidst the complex backdrop of the 1970s, an eighteen-year-old pseudo-hippie sets out to find answers without knowing the questions. His search for love, identity, purity, restoration, and his voice in the overwhelming and infinite universe, takes the reader on a fast-paced journey across North America. It is raw and haunting and will stay with the reader long after the final page is read." —Hannes Barnard, author of Halley's Comet
“Haunting, heartbreaking, and always life-affirming, The Early Years of Rhythm & Blues is a triumph of the spirit and a celebration of the soul.” —New York Times
“There may be no regional genre of music more prone to tooting its own horn than Texas blues, and with good reason. Alan Govenar’s new book, Texas Blues . . . is the finest, most comprehensive roundup yet.” —Austin Chronicle
“In this compact, vivid hybrid, Govenar transforms his taped and transcribed interviews with dancer Norma Miller into her account of life as a globe-traveling Lindy Hopper in the 1930s and ’40s . . . Govenar captures both Miller’s remarkable experiences (including incidents of racism on the road) and her sparkling evocation of American music and dance when swing was king.” —Kirkus Reviews on Stompin' at the Savoy
“Govenar deftly teases out . . . a dialogue about race, justice, and class in America.” —Huffington Post on Texas in Paris