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April 2008
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Unbridled Books says it has sold the film rights for Andrea Portes' "Hick." The buyers are producers Christian Taylor of Taylor Lane Productions and Steven Siebert of Lighthouse Entertainment. Though she has since departed our fair city, Ms. Portes wrote this book while living in Dallas on Swiss Avenue. You can read an archived version of our review below; an excerpt is available here. From the July 8, 2007 Dallas Morning News By ELIZABETH BENNETT It's hard to imagine a girl with more strikes against her than Luli McMullen, the precocious, brash narrator of this impressive debut novel. Luli is 13 years old, a street-smart kid who's had to pretty much fend for herself in a remote little town in Nebraska. Her mom is an aging Brigitte Bardot, and her dad's an alcoholic who can't hold a job. With little to eat in the house, Luli often goes hungry or makes do with food she and her mother steal from the Piggly Wiggly. She spends most evenings hanging out in the local pub, watching her parents drinking and fighting and getting so drunk the bartender ends up giving her a ride home. He's almost the only adult in Luli's life who gives her attention. She's always felt "accidental and unimportant" to her parents, her appearance always overshadowed by that of her sexy mom. But one night the bartender tries to kiss her, and she realizes, for the first time, that she's attractive to men. And that triggers her decision to run away from home and seek a better life. Armed with a .45 Smith & Wesson (a birthday gift from an uncle, along with a T-shirt that says "Take me Drunk, I'm Home" ) and $200 her mother had stashed behind the kitchen trash can, Luli lights out for Las Vegas. She plans to find a sugar daddy to "fawn over me and feed me whenever I'm hungry, not just with sugar sandwiches but with real-people food." Thus begins a series of horrific adventures on the road. Almost everyone Luli meets tries to use her. Glenda, a fading beauty who gives her a ride, makes Luli her accomplice in a convenience story robbery and introduces her to cocaine and all sorts of unsavory characters. A bug-eyed cowboy named Eddie pretends to be her friend, but ends up raping her and tying her to the bedpost in a cabin in the woods for three days. Someone finally appears to free Luli and help her start turning her life around, but it's her spunk and determination that keep her going against the odds. Luli is so well-drawn and her voice so original and authentic that the reader can't help but get caught up in her story. Hick is an engrossing coming-of-age novel by Andrea Portes. The Nebraska native resides in Los Angeles, but she lived in Dallas on Swiss Avenue while writing and editing this book. It's an auspicious beginning from a writer who knows a good story and how to tell it. Elizabeth Bennett is a freelance writer in Houston. |
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