Review: Epic, if a bit unwieldy undertaking
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 05 25, 2014
And I mean that for the author and his readers. This was an epic undertaking for me. My first experience reading Akley was his “Crossroads from Damascus” novel, so I’d already experienced his tendency to jump around in time and perspective, so was prepared for it this time. But despite that, it took some time for me to get into the rhythm of the novel. As other reviewers have noted, this is very much a southern gothic novel with not so obtuse references to Sophocles’ Oedipus AND Faulkner. And about one-third of the way into the story, I stopped to read through the timeline at the end and that helped me significantly through the remainder of the novel.The words themselves are well-crafted and Akley has a knack for language that many would-be writers could only dream of. Everything from, “Sincerity is hard to recover once you’ve lost it. That’s why some intentions are best left guessed at. For how else do we recognize each other?” to “I learned the earth is not as silent as the sea. And it does give something back as you listen.”This is no simple novel of the life and times of generations of a family. This is a novel filled with tragedies, successes and small life lessons along the way. While it’s not a family that I would ever want to be a member of, the stories that unfold are what life is all about in all its glory and heartbreak laid bare for all to see, as uncomfortable as it may be.“Now that I’m an old woman I don’t believe much in choice. They say people can change, but I don’t think that’s the whole truth of it. Seems like it’s the circumstances that give people the chance to be different, different from what they were in the past. Just depends on whether the circumstances are better or not as to where they give the credit, or the blame. I guess that’s why I never saw the point in plans, especially if they tried to involve me. Seemed like it was just a way to give folks a sense of purpose so they felt like they were in control of something, if anything in control of themselves…”