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Crying out to Heaven
The one upside to spending so much time at home was that--most of the time, at least--I wasn't too sick to read. Maybe I could've pushed myself to get through a little more, but I'm content with finishing one novel, starting another, and making substantial progress on a third.
The round house was the novel I finished and it was a terrific read. In retrospect, I understand the critiques on Goodreads even less. I suppose it seems to take too many detours only if you're accustomed to whodunnits that lead you by the nose. Every character ends up being necessary to the story in some way or another, even someone as minor as the girl from Montana the narrator's best friend falls for. At first the tribal legends murmured by an old man in his sleep seem like extraneous colour but then a casual comment in the final pages reveals how they present a traditional view of justice at odds with what the protagonist's family have to deal with day-to-day.
The complaint about all the non-Indian characters being unsympathetic seems particularly gratuitous. All I can figure is that these came from readers more comfortable with uplifting tales of white saviours arriving on distant reservations to uplift the Natives rather than the more common experience of profiteers, renegades, and those who couldn't find more desirable assignments. The (white) villain of the novel is presented as essentially irredeemable, but that's the Problem of Evil that most writers end up grappling with at some point or other.
Erdrich makes the intelligent choice of having the narrator speak with the lived experience of an adult reminiscing rather than just the limited view of a randy teenager. This allows him to intersperse the narrative with comments on how things ultimately turned out, thus providing a spot of relief from the sometimes crushing weight of contemporaneous events and obviating the need for an afterword.
And it was awfully heavy going at times. More than once, I realised that with a little effort I could push through and finish another chapter or even the entire novel, but I felt the need for some breathing room. I actually sobbed at the climax, something which almost never happens to me with novels. I felt the weight of the events and the emotions as I puttered around the house and sat with them for as much as an hour at a time. It was a wonderfully indulgent way to read and a fulfilling glimpse of a retirement I'd love to have the leisure to experience.
The round house was the novel I finished and it was a terrific read. In retrospect, I understand the critiques on Goodreads even less. I suppose it seems to take too many detours only if you're accustomed to whodunnits that lead you by the nose. Every character ends up being necessary to the story in some way or another, even someone as minor as the girl from Montana the narrator's best friend falls for. At first the tribal legends murmured by an old man in his sleep seem like extraneous colour but then a casual comment in the final pages reveals how they present a traditional view of justice at odds with what the protagonist's family have to deal with day-to-day.
The complaint about all the non-Indian characters being unsympathetic seems particularly gratuitous. All I can figure is that these came from readers more comfortable with uplifting tales of white saviours arriving on distant reservations to uplift the Natives rather than the more common experience of profiteers, renegades, and those who couldn't find more desirable assignments. The (white) villain of the novel is presented as essentially irredeemable, but that's the Problem of Evil that most writers end up grappling with at some point or other.
Erdrich makes the intelligent choice of having the narrator speak with the lived experience of an adult reminiscing rather than just the limited view of a randy teenager. This allows him to intersperse the narrative with comments on how things ultimately turned out, thus providing a spot of relief from the sometimes crushing weight of contemporaneous events and obviating the need for an afterword.
And it was awfully heavy going at times. More than once, I realised that with a little effort I could push through and finish another chapter or even the entire novel, but I felt the need for some breathing room. I actually sobbed at the climax, something which almost never happens to me with novels. I felt the weight of the events and the emotions as I puttered around the house and sat with them for as much as an hour at a time. It was a wonderfully indulgent way to read and a fulfilling glimpse of a retirement I'd love to have the leisure to experience.