Sometimes a Great Notion – Ken Kesey

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Book #420

Reviewer: Kara

Sometimes a Great Notion is a great American novel if I’ve ever read one (and I’ve read a few). It’s long and meandering, overflowing with detail. The characters are exceptional; they’re stubborn and angry and very much alive. The setting is soggy and green, with big trees and beer drinking – just like a real Oregon winter.

The novel tells the story of Wakonda, a fictional logging town on the Oregon coast. Virtually everyone is on strike, except for the Stampers who are continuing to log and jeopardizing the whole strike, for no reason except that they’re renegades like that. The crux of the story is the broken, vengeful relationship between Hank Stamper, the oldest son of patriarch Henry, and the leader of the clan since Henry was injured, and his younger half-brother Lee. Hank is strong, hardworking, and prone to fist fights. Lee is an intellectual who spent much of his life on the east coast and hasn’t logged a day in his life until he returns to Oregon.

Hank and Lee are surrounded by a host of other characters, both family members and townspeople, whose stories are woven into the Stamper story like the soft-needled green pine saplings that grow in droves around the ancient giants in an Oregon forest.

This plethora of stories and perspectives makes diving in to the novel a little difficult. Kesey constantly bounces from one character’s perspective to another without chapter or section breaks to clue in readers. Frequently there are multiple perspectives at once (one in parenthetical notes sprinkled among the other). For the first 100 pages, this meant I had to keep careful track and watch for the perspective switches. From then on though, I knew the characters well and the switches became more obvious. The style became fascinating instead of hard work. Kesey also throws in a little light stream-of-consciousness in tense situations, especially between the two brothers. Nothing too extreme, but enough to heighten certain moments to great effect.

What ties all these other characters and their stories to the main plot line is that every character, major or minor, is yearning to be true to him or herself. Some are succeeding, many are failing, but the striving is what Sometimes a Great Notion is all about. Hank (and a minor character called Biggy Newton too) goes through life fighting and knowing that fights are inevitable, but is just so tired of being sized up and having to size up other big men. Lee is struggling to deal with his identity as a Stamper, and yearns most to win against his brother, to steal back what he feels Hank stole from him. Viv, Hank’s wife, has given up the things she swore she never would, like cutting her hair short and having birds. Joe Ben, a Stamper cousin, is both religious and superstitious, and optimistic to a fault. He is also a bit of a foil – as a young man he struggled in his father’s shadow, but later he is exactly who he wants to be, and is the happiest character in the book for it.

The yearning among the characters to be true to themselves comes to a climax as the novel closes. I don’t think it’s too much of a giveaway to quote Lee when he says that each of us has a stronghold that can never be taken, only surrendered, and he wants his back:

“Which meant winning back the strength I had bartered away years before for a watered-down love. Which meant winning back the pride I had exchanged for pity.”

Opening Lines

Ms Oh Waily1 Comment

Today’s Opening Line:

I have lost count of the days that have passed since I fled the horrors of Vasco Miranda’s mad fortress in the Andalusian mountain-village of Benengeli; ran from death under cover of darkness and left a message nailed to the door.

The Cement Garden – Ian McEwan

inspirationalreads1 Comment

Book #302

Reviewer: Inspirationalreads

The Cement Garden is McEwan’s first novel, and while there is not much to link it to his later and more well known novels such as Atonement or On Chesil Beach, his familiar unsettling touch and straight forward prose is clearly evident and should be welcome signs to McEwan’s fans.

Told from the perspective of 15 year old Jack, the story opens shortly before the death of his father. He is the second of four children ranging from six to 17 years old, there is a distance between the children and their father which is more than made up by the uncomfortable closeness of the children, particularly Jack and his two sisters, 17 year old Julie and 13 year old Sue.  And so, we come to a disclaimer that is becoming quite a regular feature in my reviews; this short novel is not for the faint-hearted or easily icked-out.  The uncomfortable tone of this story kicks off right from the start and it begins with the game of doctor Jack and his two sisters are playing in the opening passages.  When the children’s mother also passes away not soon after their father, the children decide to bury their mother in cement in their basement to prevent them being put into care and possibly separated.

What happens next is a predictable spiral into chaos and disorder.  The children are ill-equipped to look after themselves or each other and each reacts to this horrible turn of events differently.  Tom, the youngest at 6, regresses into baby-like behaviour.  Sue withdraws into her books and diary.  Julie at 17 attempts to take on the running of the household, not always successfully.  And then there is Jack.  Even before the passing of their parents, Jack was already unsavoury (I really can not think of a better word). It is through Jack’s eyes and the presence that Jack imposes on his surroundings that McEwan brings his skill of unnerving.  Jack goes out of his way to stay unwashed, revelling in the impact his acne-ridden image has on his mother and siblings.  He is unhealthily interested in his sisters but stays on the fringes, his observations more from his peeping and spying than from the intention of looking out for his family.

What I have been skirting around is that there are incestuous overtones going on here.  All right, there is actual incest that occurs in The Cement Garden.  There, I’ve said it.  Kind of a spoiler but not a huge one as it occurs very early on and seems to be one of the key things associated with the story.  Which is a shame as it seems to be a major thing when really it is a factor in this disturbing tale.  While it is right up there in uncomfortable stakes, it is more the idea of the blurred lines of what should and should not be for these children who are put into a very adult (and a macabre one at that) situation.  While it is predictable that the wheels will come off, it is what happens along the way that is is interesting; interesting, awful, tense  but like the proverbial train wreck, hard to turn away from.

Yet, for all this there is a forced feeling to it all.  It is an interesting situation that these children are in but I found myself thinking more about the motivations of McEwan rather than that of our characters.  I thought more about what he was hoping to achieve with it all, then let myself be carried away by the story itself.  There is an emotional aloofness, an almost calculated feel to it.  I admire it for the technical brilliance that is always evident in McEwan’s work and this his first, is no exception.  A small part perhaps is down to me wanting to distance myself from something so abhorrent to me,  that these characters are so odd and the situation so perturbing that I found myself reading from afar rather getting right into the story.  But also, the style of writing is distancing and cold itself, of which I suppose I should be thankful but ultimately did not really allow me to enjoy it fully.

This is a quick read, interesting in parts and a quite easy one to cross of the list if you don’t mind being creeped out a little.  Sorry, creeped out a lot.  McEwan seems to be quite popular among the film community as this is one of six of his novels that have been adapted to film, Enduring Love and Atonement included and both on the list.  So, not highly recommended by me but being a quick read works in it’s favour.