Skip to content
Local author’s reissued novels feature cover art created by fellow locals.
By Charlie Pogacar
NEWS OF ORANGE STAFF WRITER
When writer David Payne was seeking to reissue three of his novels, he didn’t have to look far to find help in creating the cover art. In fact, he didn’t even have to leave town.
With Hillsborough resident Elizabeth Matheson’s original photography, and the design skills of April Leidig, owner of Copperline Books in Hillsborough, three of Payne’s novels have been reissued, featuring beautiful new covers.
“It really is remarkable,” Payne said. “Everyone involved in this is within a 3-to-5 block radius. Hillsborough is just a very sweet place with a lot of mutual support in the literary community.”
Here’s how the story came to be: Payne, who grew up in Henderson, has been traveling to the Outer Banks for much of his life. That won’t surprise anyone who has read Payne’s work, as the action in his books often unfolds on the Outer Banks.
At least in part because the work is set on the Outer Banks, Gee Gee Rossell, owner of Buxton Village Books on Hatteras Island, has had trouble keeping Payne’s novels on the shelves. According to her, the locals, and those visiting the Outer Banks, cannot get enough of Payne’s books.
Each time Payne would venture into the bookshop, he would receive a (friendly) earful from Rosell regarding how his former publisher, Doubleday Books, was doing a less-than-stellar job distributing three of his most popular novels: “Early From The Dance” (1989), “Ruin Creek” (1993), and “Gravesend Light” (2000).
As a result of that direction, Payne spent several years trying to pry back the publishing rights to all three books. In the end, it was an old friend, David Gernert—Payne’s former editor at Doubleday Books—who helped pull some strings to make it a reality. Eventually, Payne worked out a new deal with independent publisher Ingram to reissue all three novels.
Payne said the years-long process of trying to get the publishing rights to his own books was long and arduous. “It was basically like dropping a proverbial rose petal into a well,” Payne said. “David intervened on my behalf and I was eventually able to get them back, but it was one at a time, over several years. About a year ago, I finally got the last one back.”
The next order of business was to have new covers designed. Payne had long admired the photography of Matheson, which had a lot in common with his own work. Namely, much of Matheson’s photography was set in Eastern North Carolina, and specifically, the Outer Banks.
The common themes in their work are rooted in common experiences. In fact, in many ways, the duo have lived parallel arcs: not only have they resided a half block away from one another since Payne moved to Hillsborough over 20 years ago, but they have also been vacationing to similar areas of Nag’s Head for decades. When Matheson got the call to submit some photographs as options for the new book covers, she leapt at the opportunity—she has always loved reading Payne’s novels, something she started doing long before she knew Payne.
“I was completely flattered and delighted that he would even ask,” Matheson said. “It just pleased me to no end to see the way that they turned out. I hope other people like the new covers, too.”
That feeling—of being hopeful an artistic offering will be well received—is familiar to Payne. He said he is anxious to see how a new generation of readers will respond to the plot lines and themes of “Early From the Dance,” “Ruin Creek,” and “Gravesend Light.” One of those common themes is the nuances of family, says Matheson, something she connected with when reading his novels years ago.
“He writes so beautifully about young love and family relationships,” Matheson says. “I think a new generation of young people will love these books for that reason—these topics are eternal, no matter what decade one is in.”
Matheson’s recent review of the books mirrors the praise originally heaped on the novels by book critics across the country. For example, when “Ruin Creek” was first published 30 years ago, The Washington Post Book World wrote:
“[Payne] understands that place most families inhabit—somewhere between love and necessity, between truth and myth, between self and the expectations, the dreams and, ultimately, the separateness of others. ‘Ruin Creek’ has an elegiac beauty. It celebrates the power of family love, even as it chronicles its dying… Writing this fine evokes a past time, but also a state of boyhood that is timeless.”
Another theme that grounds the three novels is the smalltown dynamics so many Hillsborough readers will recognize. It’s another hallmark of the three timeless tales, which are now restocked on the shelves of independent bookstores everywhere, as well as bookshop.org.
“I’d like to hope that there is something alive in these books that has kept readers coming back to them,” Payne said. “That’s why I fought so hard to help make them available to another generation of readers.”
Payne encourages readers to either purchase the book directly from a bookstore like Buxton Village Books, or, of course, Purple Crow Books, 109 W. King St. in downtown Hillsborough. In lieu of that, a portion of the proceeds from sales at bookshop.org goes toward supporting independent bookstores.
