jamiereadthis's Review of Father and Son (Niagara Large Print S.)

by Larry Brown

"Father and Son" tells the story of five days following Glen Davis s return to the small Mississippi town where he grew up. Five days. In this daring psychological thriller, these are five days you ll never forget.Convicted and sentenced on a vehicular homicide charge, Glen is the bad seed--the haunted, angry, drunken, and dangerous son of Virgil and Emma Davis. Bobby Blanchard is the sheriff, as different from Glen as can be imagined, but in love with the same woman--the mother of Glen s illegitimate son.Before he s been back in town thirty-six hours, Glen has robbed his war-crippled father, bullied and humiliated his younger brother, and rejected his son, David. Bobby finds himself sorting through the mayhem Glen leaves in his wake--a murdered bar owner, a rape, Glen s terrorized family, and the little boy who needs a father. And, as he gets closer and closer to the murderous Glen, tension builds like a Mississippi thunderstorm about to break loose.This classic face-off of good against evil is told in the clear, unflinching voice that won Larry Brown some of literature s most prestigious awards. And, reverberating with dark excitement, biblical echoes, and a fast, cinematic pacing, this novel puts a new side of his genius on display--the ability to build suspense to an almost unbearable pitch."Father and Son" is the story of a powerfully complex kinship, an exhilarating and heart-stopping story.1997 Southern Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction"

Oh, whoops. OK. I’ve been reading this book “over a month” but really I was reading Provinces of Night five more times (not kidding) and this only took something like three days, because it was good, so good, and dark and brutal but Larry Brown kind of good. It will stick with me, I can tell from the time I’ve already spent thinking about Jewel and David and Virgil and Mary, and it didn’t do what I feared, which was make one man too good and the other too evil. No, both are drawn in shades and they’re living and breathing and it’s all the more unnerving. I keep going back to look up sentences, trying to figure out how Larry Brown gets to places so complex with prose so straight and simple. The cover blurb claims the model is Faulkner but if Faulkner is anything it’s dense and opaque and Father and Son is pure transparency.

Father and Son (Niagara Large Print S.)

by Larry Brown

Reviewed by jamiereadthis on Oct 18, 2011

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