The Locals

by Jonathan Dee

[jamiereadthis]

It’s not often I can say that I like a book for its depiction of small-town government more than its depiction of people. And that sounds boring, but it’s… not. There’s no one here to get invested in, they’re Franzen characters, but it’s the interactions and machinations and inevitable decline into the political morass we have today that makes the story interesting. It’s not really a parable. What’s the way out? This book doesn’t have it. What’s a better solution? Not here either. It just shows how we get there and leaves it at that.

In a way, I think one solution is to read the books I usually read, where characters are wrong and dumb and noble and funny and right in a lot of ways too. If we keep seeing people as their worst selves, as in this book, we sink toward hating everyone. If just one of these characters actually liked someone else for being weird or broken or stubborn, then the story starts to change.

Ironically, the best part of the whole book is the prologue. It’s one of the best things I’ve read about the immediate 9/11 aftermath. It’s funny and sociopathic and introduces the most interesting character of the book, even when he then disappears for the rest of the book. But I know why Jonathan Dee had to include it. It’s too good to leave out.

Four stars for doing nothing I like in a novel but being an interesting read nonetheless. Five stars for the prologue, a story unto itself.