Apparently this is a reimagining of David Copperfield but set in Appalachia in the 1980s to early 2000s, but since I haven’t read my Dickens I don’t have anything to say about that. The story is very rich, the voice of the narrator (the main character, looking back from the end of the book) is wonderful, and this is an instance where fiction provides a better window into a topic (in this case, life in rural America) than nonfiction can. Indeed, I feel like the book is as much about its place and time (especially, the height of the opiod epidemic) as it is about its characters. It is interesting to me that for all the characters who exhibit real agency (Demon, June, Angus, Annie & Mr. Armstrong), having left Lee County (or not started there) is an important part of their ability to effect change. I have precisely two complaints:
- It is so long! It really felt like it was dragging on during the relationship with Dori and descent into addiction.
- Some of the final scenes revolve in part around Tommy, a basically sweet minor character, as he becomes enlightened about the plight of his people (land versus money economy, etc.). The thing about this enlightenment is that I can very much hear in his voice twenty years later the people who “discover” on YouTube how (((they))) control the world economy, your GamerGate/Incel/Proud Boy/Trumpist conspiricism, etc., and there’s something very unsettling about that.
ways on average, it is not extremely rare to find years that have exactly one such expression. On the other hand, it may still be open to prove that there are infinitely many such years.
jblblog 