- Hardcover: 321 pages
- Publisher: Alfred a Knopf (May 1999)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0375403698
- ISBN-13: 978-0375403699
- Product Dimensions: 24.4 x 17 x 3 cm
- Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 3,137,098 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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More About the Author
Product Description
Product Description
This striking debut novel is an intensely powerful story of imprisonment, both behind walls and within the personal confines of human relationships.
Shepherdsville, East Texas, is a town defined--architecturally, financially, and socially--by its state penitentiaries, among them the bleak Hope Prison Farm. It's a town where virtually every inhabitant is either an inmate or a prison employee, a town where crime literally pays.
Shepherdsville's two most famous citizens are Sonny Hope, its larger-than-life prison director, and Hadrian Coleman, its most notorious convict. Their friendship since boyhood has followed a pattern of mutual dependence, keeping them at once in collusion and on opposite sides of the law. At age fifteen, introspective and emotionally vulnerable, Hadrian killed a man and was sentenced to fifty years at Hope Farm. However, twenty years later, he achieves the unthinkable and escapes from the prison.
After years of life on the run, he's summoned back to Shepherdsville to receive a full governor's pardon secured by Sonny, who now runs the prison and, by extension, the town. Hadrian knows that Sonny's motives are not entirely clean, that this is a favor that will require something in return. When the nature of that payment is finally made clear, he must determine who really owes what to whom and whether carrying out Sonny's demand will result in a lifetime spent in his power. As Hadrian vacillates between loyalty to his friend and the struggle to do right, he is pulled toward a final showdown with Sonny--a crisis that will not only change the lives of the two men but also finally free Hadrian from Shepherdsville and from his past.
Hadrian's Walls won the Steven Turner Award, given by The Texas Institute of Letters for the best first work of fiction.
Shepherdsville, East Texas, is a town defined--architecturally, financially, and socially--by its state penitentiaries, among them the bleak Hope Prison Farm. It's a town where virtually every inhabitant is either an inmate or a prison employee, a town where crime literally pays.
Shepherdsville's two most famous citizens are Sonny Hope, its larger-than-life prison director, and Hadrian Coleman, its most notorious convict. Their friendship since boyhood has followed a pattern of mutual dependence, keeping them at once in collusion and on opposite sides of the law. At age fifteen, introspective and emotionally vulnerable, Hadrian killed a man and was sentenced to fifty years at Hope Farm. However, twenty years later, he achieves the unthinkable and escapes from the prison.
After years of life on the run, he's summoned back to Shepherdsville to receive a full governor's pardon secured by Sonny, who now runs the prison and, by extension, the town. Hadrian knows that Sonny's motives are not entirely clean, that this is a favor that will require something in return. When the nature of that payment is finally made clear, he must determine who really owes what to whom and whether carrying out Sonny's demand will result in a lifetime spent in his power. As Hadrian vacillates between loyalty to his friend and the struggle to do right, he is pulled toward a final showdown with Sonny--a crisis that will not only change the lives of the two men but also finally free Hadrian from Shepherdsville and from his past.
Hadrian's Walls won the Steven Turner Award, given by The Texas Institute of Letters for the best first work of fiction.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
Format:Hardcover
What a great book, well written, strong voice, great plot, and Draper has to cop-out in the ending. Hadrian is an incredibley interesting character, one you inevitabley love once you weed out prelimenary judgements. Then again throughout the novel you realize that nothing, especially Sonny, are as they first seemed. Each story has a newly revealed deeper meaning as Draper lets you piece each part of Hadrian Coleman's life. The novel said so much in the first 266 pages that it covers for the meaningless, dead ending that I was left with. Despite the book's terrible finish I still reccomend it, and from a critic like me that says a lot.
Format:Hardcover
I was priviliged to meet Mr. Draper at a book signing in Longview, Texas last week. Soon thereafter I finished the book, whch has characters which not only have depth and dimension but who I know as counterparts in everyday life. Although they are (honestly) fictitous, they are flesh and blood within this story, and will be to anyone who has lived around small, east Texas towns like Sheperdsville (or Huntsville, Palestine, or any of the other Texas towns that the prison system holds as the primary local industry). Hadrian Coleman is the new honorable man in a world turned against him. I look forward to Robert's next book, which he assured me he's well along on. I'll be waiting to read the galleys when I can get my hands on them.
Format:Hardcover
In his debut novel, Robert Draper deftly steers his reader off the main highways and deep into the red-dirt cotton fields and the dark pine forests that lie east of Houston, Texas to visit a company town where incarceration is the company business. Shepherdsville (standing in for Hunstville), Texas is the home of the state prison system bureaucracy and many of its notorious penitentiaries. The compelling story skips around the lives of two small-town boys who grew up together and remain bound to each other in ways that they do not imagine. One would become the town's top prison boss; the other would become the prison's only successful escapee. It is a story of loyalty, lies, love and legacies among fathers, sons and best friends. Those who have enjoyed the crisp writing and engaging character descriptions from Draper's many pieces in Texas Monthly and GQ magazine will not be disappointed by his first novel. Draper starts off wordy in the first chapter (would anybody in East Texas really describe someone as "Mister Loquacious"?); but he quickly recovers his sense of economy and delivers a clear winner.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
This is a true taste of Texas
For all those wishing to know what "real" Texas is all about read this book. The characters are straight out of central casting and can be found on any street corner in... Read more
Published on 20 May 1999
A good read from an author worth watching in the future.
Draper obviously knows the Texas prison system. His writing style (especially the manner in which he handles the dialogue between characters)makes some of the reading a little... Read more
Published on 5 May 1999
Forgive The Flaws
My favorite characters are weary, wary dispossessed souls who somehow maintain their principles despite being dealt a rotten hand in the game of life. Read more
Published on 2 May 1999
Muddled and pretentious
Reading this overwrought first nocel is like trying to wade your way through a swamp of molasses. It's meant to be lyrical and deep, but it's actually rather shallow and verbose. Read more
Published on 27 April 1999
A thrilling first novel.
It's rare to find a debut novel with such rich, yet real characters as are found in Hadrian's Walls. The plot is exciting and the novel is truly a page turner. Read more
Published on 31 Mar 1999
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