Davis combines religion, voodoo, New Age philosophy, and good old-fashioned capitalism, greed, envy, and a host of other unsavory motives in his entertaining first novel.
Davis exploits rich fictional potential ... Davis obviously knows his stuff, and he captures the appeal of voudou for even the casual spiritual tourist, and its meaning for the true believer. Corina Youngblood is a compelling creation ... characters are well drawn and appealing, and the novel moves along at a fine pace ... With nods to both Walker Percy in its thoughtfulness and John Kennedy Toole in its rambunctious humor, Corina’s Way , an insightful and affectionate tribute to New Orleans, is the perfect summertime offering, no matter what saints you pray to.
The Times-Picayune - Lolis Elie
Davis's debut novel is truly creole — a madcap blend of voudou botanicas, Cuban developers, upper echelon girls' school shenanigans, love affairs, JazzFest horrors, and good ol' crime, New Orleans style. Corina's way is to evoke the spirits to do what's right. Davis's tour of New Orleans should be on every visitor's docket. He captures the steamy, cockeyed, and seedy side of the city while embracing its many charms and quirks.
Only a writer with authentic, detailed knowledge of the everyday world of modern voodoo, hoodoo, and santeria practices in the United States could have brought together the rich elements provided in this compelling first novel. Only a storyteller forcefully bringing firsthand knowledge of them from that world could have produced it. Rod Davis is the author blending these powers together and the result is the fast-paced, rewarding prose of Corina’s Way .
author of Keepers of the Earth - LaVerne Harrell Clark
Rod Davis’s Corina’s Way is ... a racy tour down the side streets of New Orleans—as Kurt Vonnegut might conduct it—rich with the clash of cultures, alive with Afro-Cuban santos, dark with duplicity and danger, and healed by a gospel chorale. Corina’s Way is a fast-paced tale that leaves you thinking.
author of Crooked Man and the Tubby Dubonnet mystery series - Tony Dunbar
Make room on that crammed New Orleans shelf for Corina's Way , a multi-layered tale of suspense about our mysterious underbelly and its all-seeing navel.
author of Messiah - Andrei Codrescu
A charming guide to a world most of us will never get to visit ...
Hats off to Rod Davis who has made the arcane intricacies of voodoo enjoyable and coherent. Corina is an unforgettable character, and her squabble with former lover and big-boy botanica-supplier Delgado makes for a delightful adventure. After reading Corina's Way , you'll want to hop a plane for New Orleans and look for a real-life Corina, hosting the spirits at some local traffic crossing.
author of The Story in History and other works - Margot Fortunato Galt
Rod Davis has written a very knowing and hilarious account of Corina, a streetwise Pentecostal psychic turned Voodoo priestess who sees her ‘santos’ in all the bywaters and back streets of the Big Easy. Davis knows how hip and modern these ancient African gods of ‘voodoo’ really are. Mixing up Jesus and Shango, Oshun and St. Jude, Corina has her way in a world of Leather Lounge bartenders, Garden District school girls, Cuban hustlers, and those preternaturally corrupt politicians who seem to flourish best in the crooked reaches of southern Louisiana.
author of The Sacred Arts of Haitian Vodou and Vodou Things - Donald J. Cosentino
Rod Davis is a good guide to the New Orleans underworld of voodoo and botanicas, and his novel is a lively account of the people who circulate in that twilit realm dealing in magic and spells, and occasionally love and rivalry. His heroine, Corina, is from a long line of spellbinding women, from Circe to Carmen, who give their hearts away but always with one eye open. A fine first novel by a seasoned writer.
author of West of the American Dream: An Encounter with Texas - Paul Christensen
The author takes readers on a ride filled with plot twists and turns ... (Readers) will undoubtedly enjoy this roller-coaster story ...
Dallas Morning News - Charles Ealy
Corina’s Way is a triumph in Southern storytelling ... a bubbling pot of clever insanity. Davis’s pen leaks wit and cunning on each page ... Each chapter flows seamlessly and we discover something of ourselves in each realistically crafted individual ... a beautiful stroke of fiction.
Rod Davis's novel, Corina's Way , is an absorbing tale of Corina Youngblood, a New Orleans spiritual healer in the African/Haitian derived practice of 'Santos'. Corina's efforts in the healing work of the body and soul becomes a meditation on American marketplace culture, where even emotional well being can be turned into a commodity. But in a powerfully rendered climactic scene, Rod Davis makes a thrilling and transcendent gesture that lifts his characters and readers, if only briefly, out of our all too human craving for whatever we want at the expense of others.
author of Tragic Magic and Darktown Strutters - Wesley Brown
(Rod Davis) is the literary heir to Walker Percy and John Kennedy Toole. Corina’s Way begs for a sequel.
Biloxi Sun Herald - Eric Nye
More than any author I know Rod Davis understands and knows that hidden Southern space where the ancient currents of African spirituality still linger in the American soul. Corina's Way , a story of faith and redemption, is a wonderful and powerful novel, a stunning fictional debut from an author who has already brought us what is arguably the finest account of Voudou in America.
Mix a little voodoo ritual, a little love, and a little hate, and you have one intriguing novel.
Southern Living - Tom Black
The author takes readers on a ride filled with plot twists and turns ... (Readers) will undoubtedly enjoy this roller-coaster story ...
Hats off to Rod Davis who has made the arcane intricacies of voodoo enjoyable and coherent. Corina is an unforgettable character, and her squabble with former lover and big-boy botanica-supplier Delgado makes for a delightful adventure. After reading Corina's Way , you'll want to hop a plane for New Orleans and look for a real-life Corina, hosting the spirits at some local traffic crossing.
author of The Story in History and other works
Mix a little voodoo ritual, a little love, and a little hate, and you have one intriguing novel.
Rod Davis has written a very knowing and hilarious account of Corina, a streetwise Pentecostal psychic turned Voodoo priestess who sees her ‘santos’ in all the bywaters and back streets of the Big Easy. Davis knows how hip and modern these ancient African gods of ‘voodoo’ really are. Mixing up Jesus and Shango, Oshun and St. Jude, Corina has her way in a world of Leather Lounge bartenders, Garden District school girls, Cuban hustlers, and those preternaturally corrupt politicians who seem to flourish best in the crooked reaches of southern Louisiana.
author of The Sacred Arts of Haitian Vodou and Vodou Things
Make room on that crammed New Orleans shelf for Corina's Way , a multi-layered tale of suspense about our mysterious underbelly and its all-seeing navel.
Only a writer with authentic, detailed knowledge of the everyday world of modern voodoo, hoodoo, and santeria practices in the United States could have brought together the rich elements provided in this compelling first novel. Only a storyteller forcefully bringing firsthand knowledge of them from that world could have produced it. Rod Davis is the author blending these powers together and the result is the fast-paced, rewarding prose of Corina’s Way .
author of Keepers of the Earth
Davis exploits rich fictional potential ... Davis obviously knows his stuff, and he captures the appeal of voudou for even the casual spiritual tourist, and its meaning for the true believer. Corina Youngblood is a compelling creation ... characters are well drawn and appealing, and the novel moves along at a fine pace ... With nods to both Walker Percy in its thoughtfulness and John Kennedy Toole in its rambunctious humor, Corina’s Way , an insightful and affectionate tribute to New Orleans, is the perfect summertime offering, no matter what saints you pray to.
(Rod Davis) is the literary heir to Walker Percy and John Kennedy Toole. Corina’s Way begs for a sequel.
Rod Davis is a good guide to the New Orleans underworld of voodoo and botanicas, and his novel is a lively account of the people who circulate in that twilit realm dealing in magic and spells, and occasionally love and rivalry. His heroine, Corina, is from a long line of spellbinding women, from Circe to Carmen, who give their hearts away but always with one eye open. A fine first novel by a seasoned writer.
author of West of the American Dream: An Encounter with Texas
Rod Davis’s Corina’s Way is ... a racy tour down the side streets of New Orleans—as Kurt Vonnegut might conduct it—rich with the clash of cultures, alive with Afro-Cuban santos, dark with duplicity and danger, and healed by a gospel chorale. Corina’s Way is a fast-paced tale that leaves you thinking.
author of Crooked Man and the Tubby Dubonnet mystery series
A charming guide to a world most of us will never get to visit ...
SourceSan Antonio Express-News
Rod Davis's novel, Corina's Way , is an absorbing tale of Corina Youngblood, a New Orleans spiritual healer in the African/Haitian derived practice of 'Santos'. Corina's efforts in the healing work of the body and soul becomes a meditation on American marketplace culture, where even emotional well being can be turned into a commodity. But in a powerfully rendered climactic scene, Rod Davis makes a thrilling and transcendent gesture that lifts his characters and readers, if only briefly, out of our all too human craving for whatever we want at the expense of others.
author of Tragic Magic and Darktown Strutters
Hats off to Rod Davis who has made the arcane intricacies of voodoo enjoyable and coherent. Corina is an unforgettable character, and her squabble with former lover and big-boy botanica-supplier Delgado makes for a delightful adventure. After reading Corina's Way , you'll want to hop a plane for New Orleans and look for a real-life Corina, hosting the spirits at some local traffic crossing. — Margot Fortunato Galt , author of The Story in History and other worksJohn Martin Taylor Tom Black , Southern Living Charles Ealy , Dallas Morning News Corina's Way , is an absorbing tale of Corina Youngblood, a New Orleans spiritual healer in the African/Haitian derived practice of 'Santos'. Corina's efforts in the healing work of the body and soul becomes a meditation on American marketplace culture, where even emotional well being can be turned into a commodity. But in a powerfully rendered climactic scene, Rod Davis makes a thrilling and transcendent gesture that lifts his characters and readers, if only briefly, out of our all too human craving for whatever we want at the expense of others. — Wesley Brown , author of Tragic Magic and Darktown Strutters San Antonio Express-News Paul Christensen , author of West of the American Dream: An Encounter with Texas Corina's Way , a story of faith and redemption, is a wonderful and powerful novel, a stunning fictional debut from an author who has already brought us what is arguably the finest account of Voudou in America. — Wade Davis Corina’s Way begs for a sequel. — Eric Nye , Biloxi Sun Herald Corina’s Way , an insightful and affectionate tribute to New Orleans, is the perfect summertime offering, no matter what saints you pray to. — Lolis Elie , The Times-Picayune Corina’s Way is ... a racy tour down the side streets of New Orleans—as Kurt Vonnegut might conduct it—rich with the clash of cultures, alive with Afro-Cuban santos, dark with duplicity and danger, and healed by a gospel chorale. Corina’s Way is a fast-paced tale that leaves you thinking. — Tony Dunbar , author of Crooked Man and the Tubby Dubonnet mystery seriesCorina’s Way is a triumph in Southern storytelling ... a bubbling pot of clever insanity. Davis’s pen leaks wit and cunning on each page ... Each chapter flows seamlessly and we discover something of ourselves in each realistically crafted individual ... a beautiful stroke of fiction. — Capital City Free Press Booklist Kirkus Reviews Corina’s Way . — LaVerne Harrell Clark , author of Keepers of the Earth , winner of the 1998 Medicine Pipe Bearer’s Novel Award of Western Writers of AmericaCorina's Way , a multi-layered tale of suspense about our mysterious underbelly and its all-seeing navel. — Andrei Codrescu , author of Messiah Publishers Weekly Foreword Reviews Donald J. Cosentino , UCLA professor, author of The Sacred Arts of Haitian Vodou and Vodou Things
Davis's debut novel is truly creole — a madcap blend of voudou botanicas, Cuban developers, upper echelon girls' school shenanigans, love affairs, JazzFest horrors, and good ol' crime, New Orleans style. Corina's way is to evoke the spirits to do what's right. Davis's tour of New Orleans should be on every visitor's docket. He captures the steamy, cockeyed, and seedy side of the city while embracing its many charms and quirks. — John Martin Taylor
A lighthearted but spicy bouillabaisse, New Orleans-set, by Texas journalist Davis (American Voudou, not reviewed). Corina Youngblood may never have made it through divinity school, but she's a bona fide priestess of santeria, the African mélange of Christianity and animism that arrived with the slaves and still survives. The proprietress of a small botanica in New Orleans, Corina dispenses spiritual advice and herbal remedies to her modest but loyal clientele who come to her with complaints about everything from their teeth to their love lives. It's not a gold mine, of course, but Corina gets by-until the Delgado brothers try to run her out of business. Cuban immigrants with oversized egos and ambitions to match, Elroy and Julio Delgado have come up with the idea of launching a SuperBotanica ("a Wal-Mart of spiritual supplies"), and the site they've chosen is just a few blocks from Corina. She has to branch out, fast, or she'll be undersold within a year. Fortunately, Corina has just made the acquaintance of Gus Houston, chaplain of Miss Angelique's Academy for Young Ladies in the ultra-posh Garden District. Not much of a preacher (he was never ordained and has barely read the Bible), Gus sits in his office all day, listening miserably to the complaints of spoiled rich teenagers. In desperation one day he refers one of his whining charges to Corina, who solves the girl's problems in half an hour and works out a referral scheme with Gus. Soon white debutantes are streaming through Corina's door in search of spiritual enlightenment, and she's running in the black for the first time in years. Gus, more popular at school than ever, begins sleeping with the headmistress and organizes a Gospelchoir that performs in the New Orleans Jazzfest. Still, though, the problems with the Delgado brothers haven't gone away. In the tradition of Flannery O'Connor or John Gregory Toole: a welcome romp, told in an old-fashioned style and with traditional southern charm.
