Best of Bryson City Tales

Stories of a Doctor's First Years of Practice in the Smoky Mountains

By: Dr. Walt Larimore

Narrated by: Dr. Walt Larimore

"We walked out onto a side porch, with woven-seat rocking chairs strewn across it, to look out at the hills that were literally ablaze with color—reds and yellows were painted across the promontories, with amber and orange hues specked the bluffs. The spectacular view all the way to the peak of the distant Frye Mountain reminded us of why so many chose to visit this wilderness area during the fall color season."

But the little mountain hamlet of Bryson City, North Carolina, offers more than dazzling vistas. For Walt Larimore, a young "flatlander" physician setting up his first practice, the town presents its peculiar challenges as well. Schooled in the latest medical technology, the eager doctor—his wife, Barb, and two-year-old daughter, Kate, in tow—is about to discover that there are some things in rural practice for which medical school just hadn’t prepared him. But he’s about to learn. His patients will often be his best teachers, and his classroom will range from hospital corridors and smelly barns to homey kitchens and mountain streams.

With the winsomeness of a James Herriott book, Best of Bryson City Tales sweeps you into a world of colorful characters, the texture of Smoky Mountain life, and the warmth, humor, quirks, and struggles of a small country town. It’s a world where the family doctor is also the emergency physician, the coroner, and the obstetrician, and where wilderness medicine is part of the job, search-and-rescue calls in the national forest are a way of life, and the next patient just may be somebody’s livestock or pet. And it is the place where the practice of medicine will forever shape Dr. Larimore’s practice of life and faith.

Sharing the joys, heartaches, frustrations, and rewards of rural mountain medical practice, Best of Bryson City Tales is a tender and insightful chronicle of a young man’s rite of passage from medical student to family physician. Laughter and adventure await you here, and lessons learned from the strengths, foibles, and simple faith of Bryson City’s unforgettable residents.

©2004 Walt Larimore (P)2004 The Zondervan Corporation

Fans of medical series

"Walt" reads his book well with a comforting friendly voice but I did not love his story. Not bad stories but I felt the book would have been better if the residents of Bryson City were used as the spring board for a fictional work. As it is we do not get to know anyone except "Walt" very well and have only a brush with the residents of Bryson City.

great family book!!

This was a great wholesome book that would be good for the whole family to listen to together on a trip. Made me laugh out loud often.

A piece of the NC mountains

Anyone who thinks this story sounds like fiction has never spent years in the mountains of NC. Such a slice of life! I enjoyed the stories from the midwives to the fishermen; from the realities of hospital politics to the pain of having a disabled child.

The small-town stories are almost too familiar! As a tubing enthusiast who loves Deep Creek it sounds like home!

The story is heavy on faith, just as life in NC *is* - yes, doctors here STILL offer to pray with you. Not politically correct in some parts of the country, as many expect certain professionals to exist separate from their faith. I have to tell you Dr Larimore is never condeming of those of another faith, simply expressing the joy he has found in his own - that is refreshing! A REALISTIC and joyful slice of life.

I have already searched to see if his complete collection is on Audible and will download it whenever it becomes available.

Inspiring

I found this book inspiring... Dr. Larimore has the ability to look at the toughest situation, even one where he looks like the "fool," and take that situation as a learning experience. He wears his faith on his sleeve, but I would rather have my doctor praying with me then acting as "god!"

Dr. Larimore does a great job of reading his own work... one of the best I've heard by an author!

Retelling of previous stories.

I disliked that this book was a total retelling of his other three books.
I did like the interludes of bluegrass music and Walt Larimore as the narrator.

Enjoyable tale told well.

Enjoyed this on a long car ride. it made it go quickly. Story is one that makes you laugh, then cry, then laugh again. Leaves you laughing about the description of the Miss Flame contest!

A religious message

This syrupy series of goody-goody stories is a Christian sermon that smells more like fiction than non-fiction, and was a great disappointment to me. Indeed, I felt it was mis-labeled as true stories of a medical doctor and should have been promoted as sermons of a Christian evangelist.

Not too bad, but....

Having knowledge of the area and people, this was a fairly accurate description of both. However, the narration is pretty cloying and self-promoting - to the point of distraction. I tried listening to this in car with family. They preferred country music.

Of more value to physicians and anthropologists interested in Western Carolina/Easter Tennessee ways of life. These are likely to dissappear over the next few decades as Boomer retirees move in.