Elvis Presley Calls His Mother After the Ed Sullivan Show
A novel by Samuel Charters

"Poet, novelist, & musicologist Samuel Charters steps on nobody’s blue sued shoes in this novella, which consists of a single, unbroken monologue that wails and jangles like an electric guitar solo." - The Los Angeles Times Book Review

At times hilarious, at times remarkably insightful, this intimate fictional conversation between Elvis and his mother at the dawn of his career restores a lost innocence to the personality who reshaped American music.After the infamous Ed Sullivan broadcast of Elvis Presley from the waist up, Elvis returns to his hotel with a soda pop in hand, and telephones his mother. For the duration of this novel, we are privy to a conversation that is imagined with amazing authenticity. Elvis talks of the girls and their distressed fathers, his concerts and his dreams. From his astonishment at the attention bestowed on him, to the ambitions that propelled his music, the young Elvis, early on the road to stardom, comes vividly to life. The voice, the attitude, the complete persona is captured with a simplicity that is both sensitive and startling.Samuel Charters, jazz and blues musicologist, is the author of many acclaimed studies of music history including The Legacy of the Blues and The Poetry of the Blues. This is his third foray into fiction. His first was a novel in monologue form, Jelly Roll Morton’s Last Night at the Jungle Inn, followed by Louisiana Black, which has recently been made into the movie White Lie starring Gregory Hines.