Set from the late 1960s through the early 1990s, this elegiac, unvarnished, and empathetic novel captures one working-class family in rural West Virginia as they balance on the dividing line between Appalachia old and new, with sisters Dessie and Billie Price as its urgently beating heart.

Goshen Road is an elegiac, unvarnished, and empathetic portrait of one working-class family over two decades in rural West Virginia, with sisters Dessie and Billie Price as its urgently beating heart. Bonnie Proudfoot captures them, their husbands, and their children as they balance on the divide between Appalachia old and new, struggling for survival and reconciling themselves with past hurts and future uncertainties as the economy and culture shift around them.
The story opens in 1967 with a logging accident and the teenaged Lux Cranfield’s headlong plunge into the courtship of Dessie—a leap he takes not only in the wake of his near-death experience but to exchange his bitter home life for a future with the Prices, a family that appears to have the stability and peace that his own lacks. Within the year Lux and Dessie marry. Meanwhile, Dessie’s rebellious younger sister, Billie, fights her way through adolescence with an eye toward an escape of her own, only to land with Lux’s friend Alan Ray Munn and settle into a life of hardship. Ultimately, the voices and passions of Dessie, Billie, Lux, Alan Ray, and the Cranfield children build on one another to create an unforgettable chorus about the promises and betrayals of love—and what it takes to preserve a family when everything else is uncertain.

"“[Bonnie Proudfoot] helps us enter into the realities of Appalachian life, how people both eked out a life, and really lived.”" - Bob on Books

"“Proudfoot is a talented wordsmith, and her lyrical writing is the highlight of her debut novel. She details the landscape of the mountains and dirt roads with tenderness and detail, and creates complex, rich characters.”" - Booklist

"“Proudfoot reveals the strength, nobility, and despair of those who want to climb out of the hollow yet find themselves at the bottom of a long, unkempt, winding road.”" - Ohioana Quarterly, Spring 2020

"“(Goshen Roadcaptured me from the get-go…. Bonnie Proudfoot is exceptional at setting the scene, so I felt like I could envision what was happening…. If somebody asks you, ‘Why don’t working class Appalachians just move somewhere they can get a good job,’ tell them to read this book.”" - Change Seven Magazine

"“As a deep dive into the lives and struggles of working people, the novel feels singularly capable—in a way that so many of the last four years’ worth of newspaper and magazine articles were not—of explaining our troubled nation to itself. Largely because the book is built as a series of stories, it forces us to move through time in a jump-cut sort of way. The powerful affect Proudfoot achieves with this technique throws the impact of large-scale socio-economic changes on her characters into stark relief.”" - Pittsburgh Book Review