At a crossroads, Country Roads took me home

Six years since Baton Rouge came calling

In the fall of 2018, I was interning at the literary magazine, the Oxford American, in Little Rock, Arkansas. Coming right out of LSU’s English program, it was a crazy incredible opportunity to work closely with some of the best editors and writers in the South, and to play a role in bringing an issue from inception to press.

Those four quiet months were the first and only time I’ve ever lived alone, in a 400 square foot studio apartment with my cat. I spent my days in the high-ceilinged crumbly brick-walled OA office in the downtown SOMA neighborhood, mostly fact checking stories and creating social media posts. When I’d get home, I’d sometimes take my bike down to the river, wander the sculpture garden, catch a blues concert in the park. I didn’t have any money (this was before they started paying their interns), so I couldn’t go out much; I was eating eggs for lunch every day.

But the constraints, and even the isolation, of my little existence there suited me—at least for a while. It provided me a bridge, time to figure out what the hell I was going to do next. I was doing research on Home of the Happy (though it had another name at the time)—staying up late at night transcribing the transcript from the trial of John Brady Balfa for the murder of my great grandfather. Before I’d come to Little Rock, I’d spent weeks photographing every single one of the thousands of pages concerning the trial stored in the LSU Law Library. Wanting it to be searchable, I rewrote the entire thing—searing it to my memory.

What I wanted then was a future that would allow me to write this book. But of course, I knew I needed more than that. I needed a job. A paying job. I’d completed an English degree, had done internships—including this rather prestigious one—and had won some awards. But a sustainable, secure path forward for a career writing is a rare one. I knew this, and the anxiety that I’d have to pivot kept me up at night.

So, I was of course applying to jobs. I was applying to internships. I was applying to anything I could find. In Louisiana, in Little Rock, in New York City. Anywhere. I was half-heartedly trying to freelance. At some point, I decided to put away my initial reluctance towards grad school and to apply to MFA programs—and started to fantasize about three years of writing my book somewhere in the midwest.

And then, in the same week—about a month before my time in Little Rock was to end—two unbelievable opportunities opened their doors for me.

One was an interview for a literary magazine based in New York City. Should I make it past the interview stage, the job would be part time and minimum wage; it would require some imagination and bootstrapping to make possible, but it was the sort of thing that would drop me directly into the East Coast literary world.

The other opportunity was a job. A full-time job. In Baton Rouge. I remember that when I learned about the assistant editor position opening at the small, independent regional publication Country Roads—before I had even applied—I called my mom and cried on the phone. It felt insane that against a world so wide open—the possibilities of glamorous NYC or the gothic bliss of a writing program—that Baton Rouge would call. That I would feel to my core that that job was for me.

I called the NYC magazine, and cancelled my interview.

Six years later—a promotion, a pandemic, and a move to Lafayette later—I’m still editing Country Roads magazine. And it’s never stopped feeling like exactly the right thing. Conceived in 1983 (the same year, interestingly, that my book begins) by people who love place, and who in particular love this place of South Louisiana, the magazine has given me a vessel through which to explore my own understandings of my home, from angles equally challenging and delightful. Because of this job, I have become a better writer, a better editor, and a better representative of my culture. I’ve been encouraged to keep my ear to the ground in this strange world of Acadiana, and to ask questions of what emerges.

And because of this job—such a rare opportunity to write and edit full time right here at home—I was able to, finally, write this book.

[Read more of my work at Country Roads, here.]

So, to have my first in-print review of Home of the Happy be written by Country Roads’ publisher James Fox-Smith as part of his monthly publisher’s column is an inexpressible honor. Here is an excerpt from the article, published in the November issue of Country Roads, “What Makes You a Writer?” :

“Lurid and lyrical, gothic and graceful, surreal and serene. In Home of the Happy, Jordan delivers one of the most vivid accounts of Cajun-ness I’ve ever read . . . Memoir, reportage, and investigative journalism, wrapped in a propulsive narrative that tells the tale of a family and a place across time.”

—James Fox-Smith

Though James questions his own identity as a writer in the article, he has always been, indisputably, one of the writers—and authorities on culture—that I most admire. To have his and his wife Ashley’s continued support means, just, everything.

You can read the entire article at the Country Roads website, or—if you are in the Baton Rouge and St. Francisville areas—in the print November issue starting next week. Linked below:

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In other news, Home of the Happy received two more blurbs over the last two weeks!

Ana Reyes, an alumna of LSU’s MFA program, is the author of the can’t-put-it-down thriller The House in the Pines, which was an instant NYT Bestseller and Reese Witherspoon Book Club pick. Coming from such a master of mystery, Ana’s endorsement is a total honor. Here’s what she had to say:

"Riveting and atmospheric, Home of the Happy is also a heartfelt grappling with a trauma in the author’s family and her attempts to unravel its secrets once and for all. LaHaye Fontenot’s writing is urgent, fueled not just by a desire for justice but by love for her ancestors and the Cajun community of south Louisiana. A must-read for true crime and mystery fans."

— Ana Reyes

And Ruth Madievsky, whose electric, fever dream wonder that was All Night Pharmacy—a national bestseller, winner of the California Book Award, National Jewish Book Award for Debut Fiction, and finalist for the Lambda Literary Awards—joins me in the murdered great-grandfathers club, and said of Home of the Happy:

“No one wants to belong to the murdered great-grandfathers club, but I feel better knowing that Jordan LaHaye Fontenot is here with me, tackling generational trauma and secrecy with tenderness, ethics, and the precision of a surgeon. Home of the Happy is true crime at its best. I simply cannot fathom how LaHaye Fontenot not only conducted her own investigation of her great-grandfather’s murder, but braided it with stirring personal and historical anecdotes into a taut and thrilling masterpiece. I absolutely inhaled it.”

—Ruth Madievsky