Daughtry pens debut novel

SMITHFIELD — Leo Daughtry, an attorney, businessman and former Republican state lawmaker, has ventured into writing with his debut novel, “Talmadge Farm.”

The novel is the story of two sharecropping families, one black, one white, Daughtry said. “It is a story about how their lives got intertwined, how sharecropping ended, how the economy was changing in Eastern North Carolina,” he said.

The plot takes place amid the backdrop of the 1950s and 1960s in the American South.

“Those were my formative years,” said Daughtry, a farmer’s son who grew up in neighboring Sampson County. “I thought it would make a good story and a story that I don’t think anybody really ever told.”

Though not autobiographical, the novel draws from his experiences growing up, Daughtry said. “I had a good understanding about what it was to grow up on a farm, what it was to work in the hot sun and what it was to be close to black neighbors,” he said. “But at the same time, it was clear that they did not have the same social status that the whites did. So I grew up in that environment.”

“My father owned a farm, and we had sharecroppers,” Daughtry said. “I knew them. They were both black and white. My friends were mostly African Americans. They would go to a different school. I would get in my school bus, the white school bus, and about 100 yards down the road, my friends would get in that and go to the black school.”

In those days, the South was very much black and white, Daughtry said. “There was a black school, and there was the white school,” he said. “There were black and white sharecroppers. One thing they had in common was they were all poor.”

“I wanted to write a story about them and about how changes started taking place in the ’50s and continued into the ’60s,” Daughtry said. “Tobacco was the center of it all because that’s what everybody relied on to make a living and have a way to support their family.”

Writing the novel was a journey with many starts and stops, Daughtry said. “I started years ago with an outline,” he said. “I would try to outline, maybe a chapter or two, then I would delete it and then I would start again.”

“Finally, I had an idea in my head about where I wanted to put to go,” Daughtry continued. “But the problem with that is if you start down a road and then all the sudden detour, you sort of change your way.”

Some aspects of the writing process were easier than others because they came from vivid memories, Daughtry said. “There were all kinds of events, like Mule Days, in the book,” he said.

“We have the kind of celebrations and fall festivals that most small towns have,” he said, referring to characters and events in the novel. “We have people going to Raleigh to shop and other things that I remember.”

The novel has Easter eggs for local readers, Daughtry said. “I grew up in the country in Sampson County,” he said. “The high school that I went through was called Hobbton, and I moved to Smithfield. So I combined those two into Hobbsfield to make the town. So I brought a lot of names and stuff, and that has some significant markers.”

Daughtry enlisted help with parts of the novel. “My daughter was at Chapel Hill, and one of her sorority sisters was a woman named J.J. Holshouser, who was a good writer,” he said. “I got her to help me write the book particularly as it related to the feminine side of what was going on.”

He has heard a lot of enthusiasm for the novel, Daughtry said. “A lot of people, a lot of my friends, family and other people that are my age, are excited about reading it,” he said. “I think some young people will like the historical aspects.”

“Talmadge Farm” is available in trade paperback and e-book format.

The post Daughtry pens debut novel first appeared on Restoration NewsMedia .