Early Review: Then Came the Evening

Now that my LibraryThing Early Reviewer backlog is at last cleared out, I can finally get back to the business of posting early reviews that are, in fact, early. Well, kind of.

My selection from the November batch was Then Came the Evening, the debut novel by Brian Hart. The book was actually released on this very day, December 22, 2009, and is available in bookstores everywhere. It is written in a very stripped-down bare-bones style, very reminiscent of Cormac McCarthy, so if you are interested in such titles, you will probably be very interested in my review of the book, which I've reproduced here as is my custom.

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You can tell that Brian Hart wants really badly to be the next incarnation of Cormac McCarthy. From the very first pages of Then Came the Evening, all the trademark moves are present: a grizzled, rough-edged protagonist, a violent encounter, scorched-earth imagery, and family strife. The first chapter of the novel sets up something that feels both familiar yet new, something truly promising. Unfortunately, the novel, while passable, fails to really live up to those expectations, and ends up feeling more like an imitator than an innovator.

The novel opens with Bandy Dorner, a Vietnam vet with a host of unnamed problems on his mind, awaking in a ditch, piss-drunk and having driven his car through a fence. As his father and two police officers try to wrangle him, one of the cops ends up dead, and Bandy ends up in prison for twenty years. In the meantime, his wife Iona, pregnant with his son, leaves him to live with another man. By the time Bandy gets out, Iona is a widower and a drug addict, Tracy is a grown man, and Bandy is a shell of his former self. All three reconvene on the old family farm, each hoping to find redemption in their new family unit, but the past refuses to die.

The McCarthyian influence that infuses the work is perhaps best seen in Hart's descriptions of the land, which are painstakingly detailed and as vivid as the brilliant cover image on the book jacket. The Idaho setting, familiar to the author, truly comes alive as Hart portrays a hard, unyielding environment that is dirty but hearty, tough but alive. It's clear he wants the land to be a character, and it is, particularly since the landscape plays a powerful role in some of the most important scenes in the novel. However (and I will concede it may be a personal thing, because I have the same criticism of McCarthy), the oppressiveness of the land imagery seems to cast a layer of grime and filth over the novel, as if the whole thing is tainted with dirt. The consistency of that dirtiness, in my mind, gives an unwelcome uniformity to the novel: though things change, everything feels the same.

In much the same way, the characterization throughout the novel is strong, but there's an unwelcome flatness to even the main characters that grows to become exceptionally frustrating. As an openly flawed protagonist, one should probably expect that Bandy will have a very difficult time fostering any kind of change, and much of the tension of the middle of the novel is in wondering whether or not he will. But at the start of the third act, Bandy partakes in something that he knows is wrong, that will ultimately destroy the good faith he has built, and the lack of remorse (or, frankly, of any kind of reaction from him) is maddening and unrealistic. And while Iona and Tracy do end up being reasonably well-balanced characters in the end, Iona's detox from her drug addiction is dealt with so minimally--particularly when compared to the treatment of Bandy's jail time--that it feels almost too forced to seem genuine.

In addition, Hart's attempts to create a convincing portrait of small-town America is, by fits and starts, compelling and unrealistic. While the town of Lake Fork is real, and Hart knows all the landmarks of the area that give it a sense of realism, the relationships between the various people in town don't always ring true. Rather than creating figures that struggle with their ability to accept Bandy when he leaves prison, Hart seems content to rely on types, figures that are static in their responses but that, in summation, give the sense of complexity. Few of the secondary characters, even Wilhelm, the most substantial one, make a powerful impact. And at the end of the novel, when one of the secondary characters is revealed to have done something that resonates with events earlier in the plot, the idea that no one else in the town knew it until then feels awfully contrived.

By the end, the novel feels like it has been an incredible trial, but rather than coming off as redemptive and renewing, it leaves the reader exhausted and overwhelmed. There is a nice cyclicality to the conclusion--one that does, in fairness, feel a little forced, but at least it's forgivable--but the toll it has taken to reach that point doesn't really seem worth it. It's as if Hart wants to beat the roughness into our heads, and sure, by the end, we get it, but when I reached the end of Then Came the Evening, I was almost glad to see it finished. And despite its successes here and there, when a novel leaves you with that feeling, that can't help but give you pause.

Early Review: Flying

The long, drawn out process of catching up on the late reviews I've had to do as a member of the LibraryThing Early Reviewers group is, officially, at an end! And, if I may say so myself, what a way to clear out the backlog.

In what has clearly been a case of saving the best for last--or, more appropriately, saving the longest for last--I have finally gotten around to reading Flying by Eric Kraft, a lengthy tome consisting of three novellas, two of which were previously published, that tell one continuous story. The book was originally released on March 3, 2009, and by the time I received it, it was already on bookshelves, but that does not excuse my delinquency in any way.

And as you will see by the content of my review, the time I've taken getting around to it was the most regrettable part of the read, as I have found it to be one of the best contemporary fiction works I've read in quite some time. Unsurprisingly, it was recently named one of Barnes & Noble's Editors' Picks for the Best Fiction Books of 2009, and if you're a fan of this blog, I believe you will be incredibly interested in reading more about this thoroughly excellent title, and so I present my review below.

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I feel it is my duty to begin this long-overdue review by extending my sincerest apologies to the author, Eric Kraft. When I received Flying as an Early Reviewers book many months ago, I was exiting the swamp of graduate school and simply could not motivate myself to read a nearly 600-page book. And so, despite my solemn obligations, it languished on my bookshelf for months and months. Heaven only knows what prompted me to pick it up on Monday. All I do know is that today is Friday, and the book is complete. And so I extend my apology: I'm sorry, sir, that I did not read this book sooner, because it is an unequivocally wonderful piece of literature.

The novel, which really consists of three parts (two of which were previously published novellas), tells the story of Peter Leroy, Kraft's protagonist throughout all his works. Peter narrates the story of an adventure he made as a 15-year-old, in which he built an "aerocycle" (lovingly recreated by plans found in Impractical Craftsman magazine) and "flew" (the term, he admits almost immediately, is very loosely used) to New Mexico on the pretense of attending a prestigious high school summer program. The program is a fabrication: really, Peter's friend Matthew got the spot because he never told Peter about the program, so Peter invented a new program and deceived the necessary parties into letting him go. As Peter retakes the trip fifty years later, his wife Albertine at his side, he reflects on the places he's seen and the things he has and hasn't done--and the reader quickly learns that deception is an integral part of the tale.

The novel succeeds as a read because it works on so many levels, not the least of which is the detail with which Kraft allows Peter to operate in both a fictional and nonfictional framework. Peter Leroy, we're quick to learn, is the quintessential unreliable narrator, and though the thrust of the book is his quest to right the wrongs that his deceptions have wrought, we see that his stories often are too good to be true--to borrow Albertine's words, they lack the ring of truth. Albertine becomes a great foil for him, a motivation and inspiration for him to try to come clean, but the act of deciphering what is true and what is "embellished" is constantly at the novel's forefront. It's a high-wire act that Kraft executes perfectly: we never feel too frustrated by Peter, and even at his most dishonest, he is nonetheless incredibly entertaining.

What makes the novel so entertaining, however, is the fact that it is legitimately funny, perhaps one of the only novels I have ever read that actually made me laugh aloud. It works because, unlike most funny books, the entire function of Flying is not simply to make the reader laugh. Instead, the laughter comes as the targets of Kraft's satire become increasingly more absurd. At the start, we laugh at the town of Babbington's lame attempt at "redefinition," but as each town Peter visits becomes a more potent example of the commodification of processed experiences, the original target becomes less and less absurd. But, in an expert move, Kraft allows the reader to see Peter as an increasingly absurd figure, a memoirist who tells stories that few people care to hear. Yet the reader is constantly entranced, leading us to laugh a little at ourselves for becoming so involved in the joke--a joke that works on a number of levels and evolves to remain fresh.

The novel's structure, too, is pitch-perfect as well, as each part of the novel is formed in a different way. In part one, as Peter conceives his plan and builds his aerocycle, we bounce erratically back and forth between the past and the present, with much of the focus on the nostalgia factor of the young Peter's project. The second part resembles a picaresque, in which Peter in the 1950s travels by aerocycle and Peter and Albertine in the present travel by electric car over roughly the same areas, often seeing the exact same locations in each consecutive chapter. This gives the second part a far more reflective, insightful quality. In part three, we contrast Peter and Albertine's abrupt return trip with young Peter's adventures in New Mexico, as he tries to assimilate himself (with some success) into a group of like-minded individuals. In each case, Kraft is careful to draw distinct thematic connections between the past and present, all while pacing the story at an admirably comfortable pace.

But the true joy of Flying is in its language, rich with metaphor and beauty. Kraft's sentences are marvelous, long and flowing, reading naturally and seductively and wrapping around the reader's mind in an intoxicating way. It is appropriate that he alludes often to Proust, for the influence on Kraft's style is obvious, as is the propensity towards digression. Peter is a memoirist at all times, even when he's merely reflecting on memoirs, and the result is that there are brief moments, often of minimal consequence to the plot, of self-contained truths that are so incisive that they stick in your mind. The same goes for the more humorous passages, particular those in dialogue: Kraft proves he is as comfortable with an amusing back and forth as he is with a thoroughly ridiculous and long speech. Kraft has many, many tricks up his sleeve, and he knows not only how to use them, but where to use them to gain their maximal effect.

The result, in case I haven't made it clear enough, is a novel that is an unbridled joy to read. It is long, sure, but it demands to be read, refuses to let your interest slip for a moment, and, despite a rather quick resolution in the end, makes you both satisfied by having taken the journey but leaving you craving more. It is, in that manner, like any good trip should be. One final note: my Early Reviewer copy was missing 16 pages near the end. I immediately went to the Internet, found the nearest library that had it in stock, and went to that library right after work to read the missing pages because I didn't want to miss a word. I was that hooked on Flying--and I suspect you will be too.

For Love of the Crash

I'm going to break with tradition here and give you a very important piece of information right up front. The moral of this post is this: I think I really enjoy AFI's latest album, Crash Love. And while that doesn't seem terribly important--and in fact, in the grand scheme of things, it is probably of very little consequence whatsoever--I feel like there's something to be extrapolated from this experience.

My first AFI album was 2003's Sing the Sorrow. I bought it strictly on the strength of its first single, "Girl's Not Grey," and the fact that it was on sale for $7.99. I figured there had to be more than one good song on there, right? Well, I threw it into the CD player in my car and quickly found it very hard to digest. It was weird and not terribly coherent, and at least half the songs featured animalistic screaming that I just didn't find appealing. The only song I consistently liked was "Girl's Not Grey," and it was hard to justify keeping the CD in my car for one single track when I could just as easily rip the song, put it on a mix CD--yes, ever-nostalgic reader, these were my pre-iPod days--and have one disc that featured songs I knew I liked.

And so I put it aside onto my CD rack, believing it destined to collect dust from here until eternity. But somehow, after a few weeks, I felt called back, like I needed to reexamine the disc, give it another shot. Could one or two quick listens really have been sufficient? Might there actually be a gem on there I'm overlooking because I'm more concerned about dashed expectations than I am with the quality of that with which I've been presented?

I took another listen. Nope, still hated it. Back to collecting dust.

I repeated this process several times over that fateful year, and each time I listened, I felt like I was getting no farther in my quest to appreciate the disc for anything more than a strong single and an incredible purchase value. The tracks were unyielding, unwilling to give me anything that my ears could comfortably grasp onto. The frustration mounted with each new listen.

Then finally, after around ten listens that yielded nothing, I gave it another shot--and it's hard to explain what happened. For some reason, the tracks felt different to me. I was beginning to lose myself in the guitar work and the melodies. Davey Havok's voice began to leap rapturously from the speakers and I found that, despite a year of hating, I was finding the even-numbered tracks (which, interestingly, were the ones that featured the least screaming) to be incredibly satisfying. From there, I began developing an appreciation for several of the odd tracks too, the screaming somehow now fitting the timbre of the song in ways I hadn't realized before.

And then finally, after over a year, the moment came where I realized that I didn't actually hate the disc anymore. In fact, I loved it. And yes, it still remains one of my favorite CDs.

So it was with my first AFI experience: a very gradual, slow development of appreciation. But I felt as if learning to like Sing the Sorrow was a trial that I had passed, that I could now expect to access their other work and be able to appreciate them like I hadn't before. I went out and acquired the preceding album, The Art of Drowning, after hearing that disc's single, "The Days of the Phoenix" (which I will say is arguably the best song the band has ever recorded).

And what happened? You guessed it: I hated that one too!

Now, at the risk of turning this into a novella of music reviews, I'll spare you the experience of what happened with that disc. I'll even admit that, as of right now, I haven't given it the most fair of listens. But when I heard word of a new AFI disc, to be released ominously on 6/6/06, I was thrilled. I had written off The Art of Drowning because I felt like I didn't know where the band had been coming from stylistically prior to that, so I was trying too hard to project Sing the Sorrow on their earlier material, instead of doing it the other way, which would have, you know, made sense.

When the devilish day arrived, I raced to Best Buy to acquire the CD and immediately put it in the car and cranked the volume. And once more, I was shocked and dismayed. It opened with an intro track followed by "Kill Caustic," a vicious, aggressive number in the old screaming style, and then the single, "Miss Murder." A pretty strong start, I'd say. But then the album slipped into electronic tones, techno-style ambient sounds that seemed like the second verse of "Death of Seasons" had been dragged out to album length. I couldn't wrap my head around it at all, and decided that I was, for the most part, disappointed.

But then, after a few more listens, it started growing on me and I became enraptured with that disc too--a disc that even many fans, as well as critics, had written off as not being their best work.

Later on down the line, when I went even farther back into their catalog, to Black Sails in the Sunset, I barely listened to any of it because I couldn't enjoy it. Then I recently burned it for a friend of mine and, lo and behold, I found myself attracted to many of the tracks as I relistened. Once again, it took time.

Which brings us to the present, and Crash Love. This was an exercise in self-awareness: I had figured on hating it from the get-go, so I didn't feel like I entered the first listen with any kind of expectations at all. And sure enough, as soon as I put it in, I was rather surprised. After listening to the whole thing straight through, and being relatively underwhelmed, I could point to two things missing from the disc, two things that had peppered all of AFI's work before that moment: 1) Davey's screaming (yes, dear reader, I had come to actually miss it!), and 2) the call-and-response choruses provided by their fan club, The Despair Faction. Sure, the music sounded like AFI, but it was missing some things that were quintessentially AFI, and I couldn't get behind it in the end.

It had been languishing on my CD rack for the past two months. Occasionally, I would listen to the bonus tracks (which I initially felt were far stronger than the album tracks), but I couldn't even get behind the single, "Medicate." Even my adventure to DC for the job interview, where I was hosted by a good friend who is an even bigger AFI fan than I am (the same good friend of two paragraphs previous), couldn't sway me, despite listening to Crash Love a few times in her car. The familiar story was repeating itself again.

Then yesterday, I found myself drawn to the CD again, for reasons I can't explain. I had been substitute teaching on Monday and Tuesday, and had heard no music over those two days, but I somehow found a chorus from Crash Love in my head. It prompted me to grab the CD and put it in my car, where I started from track one, "Torch Song." And a remarkable thing happened.

As I drove, the chorus came up: (Anything!) I'd tear out my eyes for you, my dear / (Anything!) To see everything that you do, I'd do. And, son of a bitch, I was singing along. Like I knew the words instinctively, like I had all along. On the next track, "Beautiful Thieves," the same thing happened. By the time the fourth track, "Too Shy to Scream," came on, I was full-on rollicking. It was, I realized, the song I'd had in my head that day, and I was finally satisfied to have heard it at last.

Just to make sure it wasn't a fluke, I listened to those tracks again last night. And sure enough, they were stuck in my head and resonating strongly, just like they had been earlier that day. It was no fluke. And even though I've only been really obsessed with the first half of the album recently, I think it's safe to say the rest of it isn't too far from coming around.

Which brings us to the aforementioned moral of this post: I think I really do enjoy Crash Love.

I know what you're thinking. That can't be it, can it? I read all of this just to find out that it's nothing more than a music retrospective? What's the point!

I can't promise I can assuage those concerns in a few short paragraphs. The truth is, when I first conceived this post, I thought it might be funny to look back in time and see how, despite different perspectives and lessons learned over time, the same exact thing happened. Silly Dave, not learning from his mistakes--that doesn't sound familiar at all, does it! I really thought it wouldn't go much farther than that.

But as I've been writing, I've also been reflecting. And after much reflection, I've decided that maybe the real moral of the story is patience above all else. It doesn't matter how much I knew, what I was expecting, or what I had planned. I needed to be patient and let the albums take their course over me before I could really come to appreciate them. In a way, that's not too dissimilar from my own present situation. I'm in the midst of great transition, with some prospects ahead that are making me equal parts thrilled and apprehensive. I've never been one to particularly like the idea that I don't know what's going to happen, particularly when that outcome isn't guaranteed to be a good one. That does not, however, make those moments any less worth experiencing. It's worth it to see those things through and to appreciate the adventure they provide, without so obsessively looking towards the outcome. It's been said before, but it bears repeating: if you look only for the destination, you'll miss the whole journey.

And so I preach patience, a commodity I'd like to think I have but could always do better at exercising. The way things are going now feels good and right, and that's enough. If I can focus on truly savoring the experience, on living in the moment as opposed to for the moment, the juice will be that much sweeter. And all those great things that I've been dreaming of and wishing for--all those things that drive my fears, when I feel like I'll never realize them--well, they could be right around the corner. Like AFI, and like those beautiful thieves, when they happen they'll be the things no one suspects at all.