Rudhraigh

So, second sitting in, and it’s done. Impressions?

1) Apparently for some reason, any story set in the American South in the mid to early stages of the 20th centuy automatically evokes a kind of folksy nostalgia, even in someone who never lived in the US. Admittedly many people will probably say that this is a result of my massive cultural overaffinity for American culture, but to those people I say go watch Forrest Gump and tell me they don’t feel connected to the historical events portrayed in a weirdly visceral way.

2) The language in the book is simple and compelling, it tried to mirror the mindset of its straight-forward, hard drinking, hard living, outdoorsy adventurer of a protaganist by speaking in a really nice drawl that I found quite enjoyable.

3) Although it brought in a lot of characters, it didn’t do an absolutely great job of making them easy to differentiate. This may be because when I’m tired I tend to skim passages heavy on uninteresting description, but I always find that books that don’t do the reader the service of easily remembered character introductions to be a bit of a pain in the ass.

4) The book was heavy on the evocative sensuosness of living in a time where dentistry was an experimental science and you saw people die on a weeky basis. It was full of tastes, sensations and smells that although I’ve never experienced, I now have a real personal concept of. It reminded me of the book Perfume – The Story of a Murderer in that way.

5) The major problem of the book was that you never really connected with many of the secondary characters, many of them seemed a little flat or uninteresting. Because the book was a catalogue of a the life of an extremely old man, there were a lot of characters that kind of just show up, do one small thing and then are thrown away. I think the book could have benefited from more character development of at least one secondary character, it would have made the story more accessible.

6)The plot played out nicely and had a satisfying end, I was genuinely sad to see it. Which I liked.

So overall, I’d reccomend this as a two day book. It’s fun and visceral. If maybe a bit of a one trick pony.

So, I started this book the other day whilst riding the train to school and read about half of it by the time I had arrived. “Oh my God Rudhraigh!”, I imagine you are saying, “You are such a ridiculously intelligent guy! However do you fit all of thise brains in such a well shaped and slimline head?”.

“Oh gosh darn Mila Kunis” I reply to my imaginary you, “You’we gonna make’a me go over all perceeollea’r'”

Now I’m imagining that you’re slowly running your hands all over your……oh….wait….sorry. Book review.

So, the book is about, according to the blurb, “a man born and orphaned in 1903: a one time inventor, snake handler, cunnilinguist, sniper, woodsman, harmonica man and newspaperman”. And it’s strange because if you just changed the 1903 to 1981 and add “registered psychic” it would basically describe me.

The book is an attempt to capture a kind of Mark Twainesque yarn about a young whippersnapper from the Hills of the continental United States. It throws around terms like Moonshine or Gusset and describes with great gusto men wanting to fornicate and kill and marry their mules. It does it quite well so far, the characters all seem fairly interesting, even if they are all a bit overgrubby and I have to say I do feel my interest kind of waning now that it’s trying to make me care about the trials and tribulations of unionised mine worked in the early 1900′s because the closest I can get to that kind of problem is when French baggage handlers go on strike because they’re not getting enough cheese breaks. Or Whatever.*

I suppose I also kind of don’t really know what to do with any story that decribes itself as “epic”, because being a fan of Science Fiction or Fantasy, you really get an overblown sense of what is “epic”. I mean, yes it may be “epic” that a man survived a life of war and poverty to become a recognised success against all the odds, but like it’s not quite as “epic” in my mind as a midget travelling through an entire army of orcs and demons to drop a ring that’s basically Crack cocaine into a fucking huge volcano.

Now that’s epic.

I shall continue reading, but only because I really don’t have any other stuff at the moment. I hope he turns out to be the dude who shoots Abe Lincoln. Or to be a vampire. Or something.

*This counts as my weekly outrageously stereotypical swipe at the French.