Nightwoods, Charles Frazier's third novel, is much different than his previous two. Both of his previous novels are considered historical fiction, but many of his facts just maybe in the category of psuedo-facts, especially his second effort. His first novel, Cold Mountain, won the National Book Award and the number 10 spot on the my Infamous Top Ten Book List here at HTH. His second book, Thirteen Moons, was on the New York Times Bestseller List and the Los Angleles Times Book List for many, many weeks.
There are several living authors that I continually check up on via Barnes and Noble (I know this is weird.) and see if they have put out anything new and was very happy when I saw that Mr. Frazier had put forth a third effort. I was even more excited when I read several reviews stating that it was written in the genre of Southern Gothic Literature, i.e. O'Connor, Faulkner, and McCarthy, which the loyal readers of HTH know is a local favorite of our editorial staff. However....
Let me start off by saying that I think, no strike that, I know that Charles Frazier is a good writer and often times, he is a fine writer. I also know that I'm a mediocre writer at best and am not wealthy, published, award-winning writer. In his third effort, Nightwoods, Mr. Frazier does many things right, but many things wrong. A fellow bibliophile friend of mine said that maybe some folks should just write one good book instead of several mediocre books. Flannery O'Connor echoes this in her take on writing, Mystery and Manners. However, I know this isn't the case in today's climate of huge publishing houses and writers desperately wanting to make money off of books turned into movies instead of lasting literature. The question that has plagued writers since the early 1900's is the one Harper Lee never was able to completely answer and we are thankful she didn't and that is, "What are you working on now?". The poor writer usually gets this question about two seconds after they have announced their newest book that has taken them a long time to work on, or in Mr. Frazier's case, five years.
All this being said, let's get to a review of the novel and let's start with the good stuff. The thing I liked best about this novel was that I didn't know what was going to happen in this book until it did. This was and is a welcome surprise. Mr. Frazier kept me guessing until I finished the last page. He accomplishes this by a slow pace of story, but don't worry, it isn't so slow that one gets bored. The other things Mr. Frazier does well, as usual, is his vast descriptions of places, feelings, countryside, and people. The mental pictures that Frazier paints find very few comparisons in today's landscape of writers. The portions of this novel that deal with his descriptions and the portions where you can see him telling the story, slowly and working through his craft were a pleasure to read and made me glad I put down what I was reading and picked this book up. But this brings us to the bad stuff.
This book was suppose to be written in the genre of Southern Gothic literature and that it was not; neither in characters or plot. As the same bibliophile mentioned above and I have often said, "Just because a novel takes place in the South doesn't make it Southern." And I will stick by this and add that just because some very disturbing events occur within a novel, doesn't make it Gothic. It takes a lot more to be both. A lot. The biggest fault I found with this book is that the majority of the characters are just too unbelievable. Luce, the main character, is a semi-hermit who lives at an ancient Lodge where she is the keeper and who graduated from high school at the most, but she thinks like a woman who has graduated from Yale with a PhD in Women and Gender Studies and American Existentialism. Stubblefield, the grandson of the owner of the Lodge, thinks and acts more like an over-indulged frat boy than a character in a Gothic novel. Maddie, Luce's seemingly only friend appears to be left-over from Cold Mountain, or maybe just a revision of the character Cold Mountain character of Sally Swanger. The other four main characters, Bud, Lit, Frank and Dolores are the most Gothic of them all, and the last three remain Gothic in genre. To be fair, the children, Frank and Dolores, could have fallen out of an O'Connor story. The other things that I didn't like about this novel all kind of go back to my original dislike, this book was suppose to occur in the 1960's, but the characters have attitudes, beliefs, opinions, and thoughts that feel like they feel out of current liberal arts college classroom. I didn't live in the 1960's, but know people who did and don't believe you would have found the majority of the opinions held by Mr. Frazier's cast in the Appalachian mountains in the late 1960's. And the last complaint is the language. I don't expect and don't want there to be books that don't contain language that you would actual hear everyday, but in this novel it seems that in an effort to be disturbing or "gothic", Frazier resorts to a cheapening of the rich language of the Appalachian region. His other novels don't do this, but this effort appears to read more like a no-plot sitcom than a novel that I know, or at least feel like, Frazier worked hard on.
I will end by saying that I am glad I read this book. It was mostly good. I hope Frazier continues to write. He is a good writer. I only hope his next effort is more like his first and doesn't feel so contrived, but don't take my word for it. Read it for yourself.
Happy Reading,
David
There are several living authors that I continually check up on via Barnes and Noble (I know this is weird.) and see if they have put out anything new and was very happy when I saw that Mr. Frazier had put forth a third effort. I was even more excited when I read several reviews stating that it was written in the genre of Southern Gothic Literature, i.e. O'Connor, Faulkner, and McCarthy, which the loyal readers of HTH know is a local favorite of our editorial staff. However....
Let me start off by saying that I think, no strike that, I know that Charles Frazier is a good writer and often times, he is a fine writer. I also know that I'm a mediocre writer at best and am not wealthy, published, award-winning writer. In his third effort, Nightwoods, Mr. Frazier does many things right, but many things wrong. A fellow bibliophile friend of mine said that maybe some folks should just write one good book instead of several mediocre books. Flannery O'Connor echoes this in her take on writing, Mystery and Manners. However, I know this isn't the case in today's climate of huge publishing houses and writers desperately wanting to make money off of books turned into movies instead of lasting literature. The question that has plagued writers since the early 1900's is the one Harper Lee never was able to completely answer and we are thankful she didn't and that is, "What are you working on now?". The poor writer usually gets this question about two seconds after they have announced their newest book that has taken them a long time to work on, or in Mr. Frazier's case, five years.
All this being said, let's get to a review of the novel and let's start with the good stuff. The thing I liked best about this novel was that I didn't know what was going to happen in this book until it did. This was and is a welcome surprise. Mr. Frazier kept me guessing until I finished the last page. He accomplishes this by a slow pace of story, but don't worry, it isn't so slow that one gets bored. The other things Mr. Frazier does well, as usual, is his vast descriptions of places, feelings, countryside, and people. The mental pictures that Frazier paints find very few comparisons in today's landscape of writers. The portions of this novel that deal with his descriptions and the portions where you can see him telling the story, slowly and working through his craft were a pleasure to read and made me glad I put down what I was reading and picked this book up. But this brings us to the bad stuff.
This book was suppose to be written in the genre of Southern Gothic literature and that it was not; neither in characters or plot. As the same bibliophile mentioned above and I have often said, "Just because a novel takes place in the South doesn't make it Southern." And I will stick by this and add that just because some very disturbing events occur within a novel, doesn't make it Gothic. It takes a lot more to be both. A lot. The biggest fault I found with this book is that the majority of the characters are just too unbelievable. Luce, the main character, is a semi-hermit who lives at an ancient Lodge where she is the keeper and who graduated from high school at the most, but she thinks like a woman who has graduated from Yale with a PhD in Women and Gender Studies and American Existentialism. Stubblefield, the grandson of the owner of the Lodge, thinks and acts more like an over-indulged frat boy than a character in a Gothic novel. Maddie, Luce's seemingly only friend appears to be left-over from Cold Mountain, or maybe just a revision of the character Cold Mountain character of Sally Swanger. The other four main characters, Bud, Lit, Frank and Dolores are the most Gothic of them all, and the last three remain Gothic in genre. To be fair, the children, Frank and Dolores, could have fallen out of an O'Connor story. The other things that I didn't like about this novel all kind of go back to my original dislike, this book was suppose to occur in the 1960's, but the characters have attitudes, beliefs, opinions, and thoughts that feel like they feel out of current liberal arts college classroom. I didn't live in the 1960's, but know people who did and don't believe you would have found the majority of the opinions held by Mr. Frazier's cast in the Appalachian mountains in the late 1960's. And the last complaint is the language. I don't expect and don't want there to be books that don't contain language that you would actual hear everyday, but in this novel it seems that in an effort to be disturbing or "gothic", Frazier resorts to a cheapening of the rich language of the Appalachian region. His other novels don't do this, but this effort appears to read more like a no-plot sitcom than a novel that I know, or at least feel like, Frazier worked hard on.
I will end by saying that I am glad I read this book. It was mostly good. I hope Frazier continues to write. He is a good writer. I only hope his next effort is more like his first and doesn't feel so contrived, but don't take my word for it. Read it for yourself.
Happy Reading,
David
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