Atlanta author Sheri Joseph explores college memories in fictional mystery and coming-of-age novel

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Sheri Joseph talks about her book "Angels at the Gate" in GPB's Talk Studio.

Credit: GPB Photo

A small, conservative Southern college on the side of a mountain sets the scene for a new literary thriller and coming-of-age novel.

Atlanta writer Sheri Joseph says she wrote Angels at the Gate in part to explore her own college memories.

It's also an exploration of class, privilege, misogyny and what happens in the dark corners of fraternities and secret societies.

GPB's Orlando Montoya recent spoke with Sheri Joseph for GPB's podcast about books with Georgia connections, Narrative Edge.

TRANSCRIPT

Orlando Montoya: When did you get the idea to do this book?

Sheri Joseph: Oh gosh. So I've been working on this book for about over 10 years. And that was probably around the time that I decided I was — I have three other books of fiction. And they are all really far removed from my personal life. And as I approached this book, I was thinking I wanted to get a little bit closer to my own experience, my own life. I really wanted to write about my college experience. So that was where I started really with the setting of the school that is my alma mater. I don't know if — should I talk about it here?

Orlando Montoya: Well, the school is called "Rockhaven." 

Sheri Joseph: Yes.

Orlando Montoya: And there is a city called Brookhaven that has a liberal arts school. But you didn't go to that one.

Sheri Joseph: I did not. No, I went to Suwannee, the University of the South in Tennessee.

Orlando Montoya: Yeah, just west of Chattanooga. It's a small liberal arts college like the one described in the book.

Sheri Joseph: Yes, very much like the one described in the book. There's very little that is changed other than the names of everything.

Orlando Montoya: Yes, because the events of the book mostly surround the mystery of a student's death, a student named Brantley who falls off the top of the carillon tower. 

Sheri Joseph: Yes.

Orlando Montoya: What are the circumstances that sort of get the plot of the going?

Sheri Joseph: So I have a narrator whose name is Leah Gavin. And she is — has a sort of contentious relationship with Brantley Sims. And, in the present time of the book, he has been dead for a year. His death is ruled an accident. And there's not a lot that is known about the specific details of what happened to him, except that he was drinking — this is a college that's kind of known for its heavy drinking — and that he was wearing his academic gown at the time that he fell off the tower. And other details are not known. It's not known if he was alone.

Orlando Montoya: It's a mystery 

Sheri Joseph: Yes. It's a mystery. 

Orlando Montoya: And that's what keeps you reading the book. 

Sheri Joseph: Yes.

Orlando Montoya: You learn clues along the way. But I also kind of want to talk about the secondary subject of the book. I think if there's two themes, it's this mystery butut there's also Leah's self-discovery and finding out who she is. So talk about Leah.

Sheri Joseph: Okay, so Leah is kind of an outsider at this school, which has a sort of tight insider culture to it. There are people who come through this sort of affluent family connections. It goes back to the 19th century. There are families that tend to send their kids to Rockhaven.

Credit: Regal House Publishing

Orlando Montoya: But Leah does not fit in. She is more crunchy, more granola, I think you would say?

Sheri Joseph: A little, yeah. She doesn't really quite know what her style is. She's lived a pretty isolated life mainly because she doesn't have siblings and she doesn't have any friends who are in this environment.

Orlando Montoya: She doesn't come from the family income that the others do. She's much poorer.

Sheri Joseph: Yes, she does not have money. And so part of the first thing that she has to figure out — because this is a school with a lot of traditions, a lot of — one of the traditions for this school is that there's a dress code. And it's skirts for women and coats and ties for men. And she doesn't own any skirts. And so she has figure out how to get herself some skirts with no money. And that just seems very much like a central coming-of-age concern, figuring out who you are in relationship to other people.

Orlando Montoya: I want to talk about fitting in in the fraternity sense, too, because this book is very much focused on what fraternity and sorority life is. Were you a Greek in college?

Sheri Joseph: I was. And I was in a sorority at this very particular school, very particular setting. So it's tiny, it's very isolated. It's 1,100 students on top of a mountain and there is nothing to do. So pretty much every student joins a Greek organization.

Orlando Montoya: I have to say I don't like a lot of the guys in these fraternities. They're very drunk all the time. They're very macho, hyper-masculine behavior of the bad kind. Why would anybody want to like these guys?

Sheri Joseph: So I think of the guys in this novel, the guys are really very nice. They're very nice boys. But this is the '80s. This is the late '80s. So the expectations for male behavior are a little more lax, I would say. And the ethos at this school is that it trains young gentlemen. It's about the education of young gentlemen. So they all do have the mindset of being a gentleman.

Orlando Montoya: But they don't act that way.

Sheri Joseph: They don't? You don't think so?

Orlando Montoya: Well, I mean, the fights, the drunken behavior. Basically, everyone is either a slut or gay. If you're a woman, you're called a slut. If you are a man, you are called gay. 

Sheri Joseph: Yes. Yeah.

Orlando Montoya: I mean why does this exist? Why do we have this type of behavior? This is — this is wrong.

Sheri Joseph: Yes, it is. It is. And it has changed now, I would hope. But yeah, this was the culture of the '80s, especially at this little isolated place, which is a fairly conservative school. One of the major problems that everyone is dealing with on campus is sexual repression of different kinds. And so yes, it is this slut shaming. And any queer person, like, doesn't really exist on campus. They are all in the closet, pretty much.

Orlando Montoya: OK, so we've talked a little bit about the culture. I wanna get back to the mystery, because this is what keeps the book going along. Brantley has fallen off a carillon tower. We don't know the circumstances. There are some clues. But over the course of the book's beginning, we kind of think that people are involved, but they're not saying they're involved. So it could be suicide. It could be he was pushed. Or it could be an accident. Are those sort of the three choices that we're presented at the beginning?

Sheri Joseph: Yes, that's essentially what has been worked out for everyone on campus to know that it's one of those options. It's ruled an accident because there is nothing otherwise to indicate that anything else has happened.

Orlando Montoya: But there are rumors, and there are little innuendos here and there, and people say things. 

Sheri Joseph: Yes.

Orlando Montoya: And so the reader kind of develops this thought of, well, what actually happened?

Sheri Joseph: Yes, and Leah, she gets to know some different people. She's in a particular social group from the beginning. It is a school where you tend to know your own social group and not —

Orlando Montoya: There are circles. There are cliques.

Sheri Joseph: Yes, exactly. And so she sort of accidentally winds up being the one person maybe on campus who has access to these different social circles that Brantley was connected to.

Orlando Montoya: I think it's a fabulous book. 

Sheri Joseph: Thank you. 

Orlando Montoya: It's for really for anyone who's struggling to fit in. And who hasn't struggled to fit in? It's about people finding their way in this great mystery, too. So thank you very much for talking with me about it.

Sheri Joseph: Oh, thank you for having me. It's been great.