"The Scummers" by Lee Maynard--Book Review

Maynard, Lee. The Scummers (Morgantown, WV, Vandalia Press 2012)

For several months, I have focused my blogging mainly on political posts due to the nature of the ongoing constitutional crisis from which the country suffers due to the illegitimate, Russian manipulated seizure of the US White House.  During that time, I have managed to read several books of an Appalachian nature but postponed writing about them on this blog.  In late November 2017, I had posted my review of "Crum", the first volume in the Crum Trilogy by Lee Maynard but I refrained since that time from writing reviews of other books within his sizable body of work. I did manage to write and post a review of "Screaming With The Cannibals", the second volume in the Crum Trilogy.  That review had been posted in late December 2017.  During the intervening time since I had posted my first review of Lee Maynard's work, I had also read, but not written about "Magnetic North" and "Cinco Becknell", his last two published works.  I have managed to actually read every published book written by Maynard except his first, "Outdoor Speak: A Humorous Guide To Talking About The Outdoors" of which I have never been able to find an affordable copy.  I suspect that book was a vehicle by which Maynard managed to obtain his first book publication and not much more so I have been unwilling to pay several hundred dollars for a copy of the relatively small edition in which it was published.  Despite my misgivings about its literary quality, I do believe that "Outdoor Speak..." would be a highly humorous piece of work based on the consistently funny material which can be found in his other published works.  But, enough asides about these issues, let's talk about "The Scummers", the real subject of this review.

Lee Maynard

"The Scummers" is the third and last book in the Crum Trilogy which includes the aforementioned "Crum" and "Screaming With The Cannibals".  Like nearly every other published word from Lee Maynard, "The Scummers" is generally believed to be a loosely autobiographical novel or, if you prefer, fictionalized autobiography.  The book begins with Maynard's protagonist, Jesse Stone, being run out of Horry County South Carolina by the local version of a brutal sheriff's deputy.   The character travels first to Wyoming where he works for a time on a cattle ranch, reads the classics by night, and survives in the world of the cowboys.  He then travels to San Francisco where he and a friend are drummed into the Army by a judge after setting a police cruiser on fire.  As the novel progresses, he manages to stay in the Army and become an MP along with a fellow solder who is also a deeply damaged and generally evil son of general which means that no matter what he does he cannot be shipped out of the military.  This character serves as a counterpoint, committed enemy, and persistent problem for the Jesse Stone character who is presumably based on Maynard himself.

Lee Maynard Photo by WVU Press

The character eventually becomes attached to another MP who is also his supervisor and coworker and manages to save Jesse Stone from both himself and the US Army.  The book rambles around the globe much as Lee Maynard himself was prone to do.  It is an entertaining read but is the least Appalachian of the Crum Trilogy.  It is worth reading if you are in the mood for mild adventure literature spiced with an occasional major crime and a few random references to West Virginia.  It tends to point out that the Crum Trilogy is not primarily about Crum, West Virginia, but more about Lee Maynard and his peripatetic lifestyle.  As with everything else Lee Maynard wrote, the book does intermittently and briefly address the author's love hate relationship with his home state and home town.  But, in the conclusion, Jesse Stone returns to Crum, West Virginia, as Lee Maynard himself often did.  

Lee Maynard Photo by Herald Dispatch