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Harrison Scott Key was born in Memphis, Tenn., and lives there with his father, Pop, his brother, Bird, and his mother until his father decides to move the family back “home” to Mississippi. Through farm work, football, and hunting, Pop works to turn his boy, who he believes is soft, into a Southern man. However, farm work, football, and especially hunting are Harrison’s own personal hell. What ensues is a hilarious look at Southern life in the 1980s from the view point of a bookish boy who desperately wants his father’s approval but also desperately wants to stop shooting at wild animals and getting up at 4am. Although Harrison doesn’t realize it at the time, Pop teaches and exposes his son to many life lessons, some good and some bad.
Harrison begins to learn this when he meets and marries his wife. Before her first Thanksgiving with the Keys he has to decode some of the strange customs and rituals of his family’s home, such as why the men eat first while the women wait in the living room.
Harrison must then transition into a marriage with a modern woman from a household where his mother brought his father anything he wanted the moment he yelled for it. (Sweet tea. Pie. The remote. Anything.) While figuring out his wife and three daughters Harrison comes to realize he is much more of his father’s son than he realized.
With his use of sarcasm and wit Key brings his story of a city boy growing up in Mississippi to life. Although Key is from Mississippi, he has the ability to look at and portray life in the Deep South through the eyes of an outsider. His stories of parenting and life with three children are touching and genuine. Although this is a memoir it is also a labor of love for his father who has always been in his eyes The World’s Largest Man.
Harrison Scott Key will read from his first novel, The World’s Largest Man, on Wednesday, June 17, at 5 pm at Off Square Books. 
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This article was printed in The Local Voice #231 (published June 11, 2015).
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