Do You like book Faraway Places (1993)?
Someone I really respect recommended this author to me. I was looking to read In the City of Shy Hunters, but wound up picking up The Man Who Fell In Love With the Moon and this book. It took me a while to get through the other novel, but this book read like taking a shot of whiskey. It is all the things I found in Man Who..., but sharpened, distilled, and condensed. It is a super quick read, but chalk full of serious thematic material like racism, family conflict, the danger of secrets, and other such taboo topics.It is basically a coming-of-age story of the teenaged protagonist. His family lives through a strife-filled year or so. The narrator's name doesn't come up in the story much; it is pretty downplayed, which gives that "everyman" universal sense to the story. It could be any of us readers in his place.The blurb for this novel simplifes the storyline and leaves the intricacies and details of what unfolds to be discovered. There are some very graphic elements in the story, but they do not overpower the narrative. Actually, the narrative is characterized by verisimilitude, I would say. The narrative unfolds the way that a person would orally tell a story, complete with tangents, off-shoots, and the circular way of coming back to where the narrator left off.I enjoyed and was impressed with this novel, especially because of its relative brevity (just over a hundred pages or so) and the fact that it was Spanbauer's first. To me this story is reminiscent of To Kill a Mockingbird, but, of course, it is its own story and a valuable one at that. Another thing I found especially valuable about this edition is the introductory elements, including a letter by Spanbauer that gives some context and depth to the writing of this novella.
—Liza
This book is remarkable. It tends to get marked down a bit, being Spanbauer's first book, starting off with a lot of imagery-laden scene setting, and, sure, it's not as massive and expansive as his following novels--Now is the Hour is like Faraway Places exploded and stretched out; just as good, exploring more deeply the themes set up in the novella--but Faraway Places is still a real whirlwind of a story. Tom's masterful in how he lays all his cards on the table from the start, informing you who will die, how things will change, and then he takes you through all of it without boring you, making you forget what you already know. His language just gives me the chills. His sentences glow. The prose is forked and lyrical. I love the way he reuses description in different ways to set up choruses that build and shift. And the characters, they're vivid. Even Jake's hardass, racist father ends up tugging at your heart, something that doesn't happen as strongly in the aforementioned Now is the Hour.Coming of age when you don't know how to, the tradition of religious faith becoming hard to swallow, the ugliness of America's past, the beauty of the natural world in contrast to the frequent cruelty of people. I can't even do it justice, trying to name themes, sum it up. It's just a really well-written, well-crafted story that'll surprise you with almost more emotion than one can take if you read to the end.
—Redd Deveraux
This is Tom Spanbauer's first book and they have just re-released it with a new intro by him. I'm not sure if giving it a new cover and a new introduction is worth spending the $15 all over again but since I'm a totally sucker for Spanbauer I couldn't help myself. And if any Portlanders are interested he is doing a reading a Powells on Wed. April 23rd. And for those of you who decided it was a good idea to leave Portland (ahem, Five) then you have to miss the most wonderful Tom Spanbauer doing his reading. Although, I do have to say I did see him do a reading once and it was kind of a let down.
—Lauren