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karlyo83's review against another edition
3.0
My Rating: 3.5⭐️⭐️⭐️ rounded down - not my usual style but could appreciate the talent and was compelled to find out what happened!!!
In the rural south of America in 1968 a story of good and evil unfolds in the form of humankind. Glen Davis is released from jail after serving 3 years only to return to his hometown to immediately commit homicide and other unspeakable crimes.
Sheriff Bobby Blanchard is a pillar of the community and is as straight as Glen is bent, he walks into Glen’s path of destruction trying to rebuild the fragile lives that are left in his wake.
Generations of bad blood, secrets and ill will have been simmering below the surface are set to explode giving the reader a look at how evil can reside and rot a man’s heart and soul.
First up… I need to let you know that there is animal abuse in this novel… I do not condone it but it’s there and I know some people will not pick up a book with it in so I wanted that clear. However, other more alarming trigger warnings are murder and rape so I wanted to alert you to those as well.
So I was having trouble picking a book and decided to try something very different for me. While there is crime and some mystery to this it is not my usual style. I have read other GoodReaders describe this one as Sourthen Noir… I am unsure if that is a real genre but it seems pretty accurate to me. It is grimy, gritty and layered with hatred. Set in the 60’s you can expect this to be not politically correct for our current times. It depicts the racism that was rife at that time, the disregard for women by some men (not all there are some good guys in this book) and a way of life that is not commonly lived these days. However never having been to America or the South perhaps some people will relate to this in more modern times than the 60’s.
This one I found really hard to rate, it is written in English but it is not an English that I speak. The accent, the way of speaking and the location are very much coming through in the writing. At times while I completely understood the words I needed to slow down my reading because I simply do not speak this way and needed to make sure I understood what was being said… that is not a problem and I actually think it was a testament to the author being able to capture a time and location of speech so well.
I struggled though because I didn’t really enjoy the story but I had to keep reading… I knew I needed to know what happened but I really did hate Glen and found his behaviour difficult to read. There are also ALOT of characters in this book albeit a lot of them are secondary or even insignificant but there are a lot of names and it got a little confusing at times.
The chapters are fairly short and the sentences are too so I enjoyed that… it did shift from POV and while it didn’t tell you whose POV we were reading at the top of the chapter it was very clear who you were reading at which time. The story only takes place over the course of 48hours which is really wild because the immense destruction that Glen causes when he is released from jail to the end of the book is quite unbelievable. Glen is a violent drunken bastard who blames everyone for everything… even as he’s driving drunk and swerving all over the road he has the nerve to feel blame toward others…
The road was crooked and sometimes the car would slide over to the shoulder, where the dirt was lumped up from the grader blades. Then he’d have to wrench it back with a violent motion of the wheel and the rear end would slide in the gravel.
“Goddamn road,” he said.
He wondered if his drunkass daddy was home. Go there and see him, tell him what a sorry son of a bitch he is. Let him know a few things. Like what a sorry son of a bitch he is and things like that.
I rated this 3.5 stars which is high but mostly because for me it wasn’t something I would rush back to… did I enjoy it… not particularly but did I recognise the talent and the feeling behind it… absolutely. It pulls at your heart the oppressive nature of the heat, the time, the poverty and sadness…
All these people would bind together for a number of hours or days in the way that only great tragedy wrought. And then their lives would have to go on and the loss would diminish for all those except the ones who lived in the house. They would wake to it every day, sleep by it every night. It would infiltrate their meals and their lovemaking and their trips to take out the garbage. The slightest thing would remind them of it. It might grow gradually dimmer with a great passage of time but it would never fully leave or be closed out like the shutting of a door. That’s what he hated about it.
Overall I can’t say whether I would or wouldn’t recommend this. It will depend on your tastes. If you’re looking for a thriller.. nope don’t go here. If you are looking for something modern and tasteful absolutely not… if you are looking for something that won’t offend …. Again probably not this one. BUT having said all that I do think that it will really be the right kind of book for those looking for something gritty, something that gets you feeling (whether it be hate, love or otherwise) you need thick skin for this book though because it is not a pretty story… from beginning to end.
In the rural south of America in 1968 a story of good and evil unfolds in the form of humankind. Glen Davis is released from jail after serving 3 years only to return to his hometown to immediately commit homicide and other unspeakable crimes.
Sheriff Bobby Blanchard is a pillar of the community and is as straight as Glen is bent, he walks into Glen’s path of destruction trying to rebuild the fragile lives that are left in his wake.
Generations of bad blood, secrets and ill will have been simmering below the surface are set to explode giving the reader a look at how evil can reside and rot a man’s heart and soul.
First up… I need to let you know that there is animal abuse in this novel… I do not condone it but it’s there and I know some people will not pick up a book with it in so I wanted that clear. However, other more alarming trigger warnings are murder and rape so I wanted to alert you to those as well.
So I was having trouble picking a book and decided to try something very different for me. While there is crime and some mystery to this it is not my usual style. I have read other GoodReaders describe this one as Sourthen Noir… I am unsure if that is a real genre but it seems pretty accurate to me. It is grimy, gritty and layered with hatred. Set in the 60’s you can expect this to be not politically correct for our current times. It depicts the racism that was rife at that time, the disregard for women by some men (not all there are some good guys in this book) and a way of life that is not commonly lived these days. However never having been to America or the South perhaps some people will relate to this in more modern times than the 60’s.
This one I found really hard to rate, it is written in English but it is not an English that I speak. The accent, the way of speaking and the location are very much coming through in the writing. At times while I completely understood the words I needed to slow down my reading because I simply do not speak this way and needed to make sure I understood what was being said… that is not a problem and I actually think it was a testament to the author being able to capture a time and location of speech so well.
I struggled though because I didn’t really enjoy the story but I had to keep reading… I knew I needed to know what happened but I really did hate Glen and found his behaviour difficult to read. There are also ALOT of characters in this book albeit a lot of them are secondary or even insignificant but there are a lot of names and it got a little confusing at times.
The chapters are fairly short and the sentences are too so I enjoyed that… it did shift from POV and while it didn’t tell you whose POV we were reading at the top of the chapter it was very clear who you were reading at which time. The story only takes place over the course of 48hours which is really wild because the immense destruction that Glen causes when he is released from jail to the end of the book is quite unbelievable. Glen is a violent drunken bastard who blames everyone for everything… even as he’s driving drunk and swerving all over the road he has the nerve to feel blame toward others…
The road was crooked and sometimes the car would slide over to the shoulder, where the dirt was lumped up from the grader blades. Then he’d have to wrench it back with a violent motion of the wheel and the rear end would slide in the gravel.
“Goddamn road,” he said.
He wondered if his drunkass daddy was home. Go there and see him, tell him what a sorry son of a bitch he is. Let him know a few things. Like what a sorry son of a bitch he is and things like that.
I rated this 3.5 stars which is high but mostly because for me it wasn’t something I would rush back to… did I enjoy it… not particularly but did I recognise the talent and the feeling behind it… absolutely. It pulls at your heart the oppressive nature of the heat, the time, the poverty and sadness…
All these people would bind together for a number of hours or days in the way that only great tragedy wrought. And then their lives would have to go on and the loss would diminish for all those except the ones who lived in the house. They would wake to it every day, sleep by it every night. It would infiltrate their meals and their lovemaking and their trips to take out the garbage. The slightest thing would remind them of it. It might grow gradually dimmer with a great passage of time but it would never fully leave or be closed out like the shutting of a door. That’s what he hated about it.
Overall I can’t say whether I would or wouldn’t recommend this. It will depend on your tastes. If you’re looking for a thriller.. nope don’t go here. If you are looking for something modern and tasteful absolutely not… if you are looking for something that won’t offend …. Again probably not this one. BUT having said all that I do think that it will really be the right kind of book for those looking for something gritty, something that gets you feeling (whether it be hate, love or otherwise) you need thick skin for this book though because it is not a pretty story… from beginning to end.
violentwaves's review against another edition
dark
medium-paced
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
pbobrit's review against another edition
5.0
Wow, just when you thought Larry Brown could not get any more intense he surprises you once again. This is a brutal, menacing book. It unfolds as many of his books do slowly at first but building momentum till you feel like your standing on the tracks and have a ten ton freight train barreling at you. The story, as with all his books is deceptively simple. Glen, the main protagonist is released from jail and returns home to pick up his life where he left off, but time and people have moved on. This book has so many themes, family relationships obviously fathers and son, but also between men and their mothers. It deals with the scars that we all carry to great or lesser extents, and also the conflicts between going with pure emotion or doing the right or completely wrong thing. Beautifully written as always, never wanting it to end, but also pulled like an objects trapped in a vortex, spinning faster and faster till you disappear into Brown's darkness.
A must read for Larry Brown fans, fans of thrillers and of quality Southern literature.
A must read for Larry Brown fans, fans of thrillers and of quality Southern literature.
whofalls's review against another edition
5.0
Larry Brown you did it again. What a book....what a book.
screamdogreads's review against another edition
4.0
Well, that was an extremely depressing experience. No amount of beautiful words, or perfect prose can cover up the bleakness that sits at the heart of this fantastic novel. There's a certain something about Larry Brown's writing, it allows the reader to see, and feel and experience everything that the characters do. Without a doubt, this is one of the best examples of country/southern noir I have ever encountered.
"He cocked the hammer now and swung the barrel up to his father's head and held the black and yawning muzzle of it an inch away. He tightened his fingers on the checkered grip. The old man slept on, father and son. Some sense of foreboding told him to pull back and undo all of this before it was done. Yet he put his finger on the trigger, just touched it. He already knew what it would look like."
This is a novel that really instills a feeling of hopelessness within you. As soon it starts, you're made aware that this kind of story can never end well, that, realistically, there are only a handful of conclusions here, and none of them are any good. And yet, there's still a purpose to reading it, there's still a reason to keep going, even if it leaves you feeling hollowed out and empty. Although the blurb describes this book as a 'classic story of good and evil' I think it's much more complex than that, the issues in this novel run so much deeper than just good and evil.
This was my first time ever reading anything by Larry Brown, and it has me wanting to order his entire back catalogue.
kansass's review against another edition
5.0
“Glen se había pasado toda la infancia oyéndole gemir, sacudirse e implorar en sueños, y le había visto sumirse en largos períodos de silencio en los que se quedaba mirando el cielo, problablemene reviviendo viejos recuerdos de los que solo hablaba cuando le daba a la botella. Se preguntó si seguiría haciéndolo. Se preguntó porque cojones los japos no acabaron el trabajo y lo mataron cuando tuvieron oportunidad. Su muerte habría puesto las cosas más fáciles a todo el mundo. Y el habría podido tener un padre diferente al que tenía ahora.”
Se me hace raro escribir sobre la fuerte impresión que me ha causado esta novela porque hubo momentos en que tuve que cerrar las páginas, no porque no pudiera seguir leyendo por la incomodidad o por la extrema violencia (que la hay), sino por la inesperada belleza que contienen muchas de sus páginas, la esencia del día a día, de lo que significa la vida en sus pequeños detalles y Larry Brown los hace tan palpables que me llegaron a conmover.
Empecé la novela cuando ya estaba sumergida en La Mansión de William Faulkner, y fue pura casualidad enterarme que ambos autores compartieron lugar de nacimiento. Larry Brown nace en Yocona, Mississippi, cerca de Oxford donde había nacido Faulkner, y esto aunado al hecho de que el protagonista de Padre e Hijo, Glen Davis, acaba de salir de la penitenciaria de Parchman cuando empieza la novela, al igual que Mink Snopes en La Mansión, me revierte al hecho de que hay lecturas que están interconectadas y no planeadas, casualidades. William Faulkner ha sido un autor que me ha volado la cabeza en este 2021, pero reconozco que Larry Brown no se queda atrás. No tiene nada que envidiarle a WF, todo lo contrario, y además he caído rendida a sus pies.
La historia que nos cuenta aquí Larry Brown es la lucha constante y universal entre el bien y el mal, entre la violencia y el ansía de paz. Cuando comienza la novela, Glen Davis acaba de salir de Parchman, la penitenciaria estatal de Mississippi, tras tres años encerrado. Los tres años de reclusión no han hecho demasiado por su paz mental, todo lo contrario, cuando vuelve al hogar, el odio y el rencor latente que lleva en sus carnes desde pequeño pone patas arriba a la familia que le está esperando. No voy a hablar mucho más del argumento porque lo que de verdad aquí interesa es como se va desvelando la vida en el pueblo tras la vuelta de Glen. Hay que leerla sin más datos.
Lo que sí puedo decir es que la novela está conformada de momentos hermosísimos donde la violencia, a veces extrema, se mezcla con un lírismo inesperado, sorprendente: largos viajes en coche de noche o de día, donde el lector es capaz de visualizar el paisaje del Delta o momentos de extrema naturalidad de personajes sentados en el porche de la casa, oyendo los sonidos que se entremezclan en estos silencios y donde quizá un faro del coche que se detiene por unos minutos, hace saltar chispas de tensión dosificada. Larry Brown captura la vida rural como nadie. Sus diálogos son parcos, minimalistas, pero al mismo tiempo están repletos de una humanidad inesperada entre tanta aridez.
Y por otra parte estoy convencida de que el retrato de un personaje como el de Glen, solo puede provenir de un maestro. Glen Davis, un personaje violento, atormentado, casi inhumano, que no deja títere con cabeza y sin embargo llegado un punto, Larry Brown es capaz de infundirle ese retazo de humanidad, ese reconocer por parte del lector que no hay criaturas perfectas y que todos llevamos dentro una vena de oscuridad.
En definitiva, es una novela colosal cuyo texto habla por sí mismo. Atmosférica, contundente, con unos personajes de los que no sobra ni uno, es una novela que me ha llegado al alma. Hay que leerla. Top 2021.
"Virgil identificó el coche de Jewel aparcado bajo un árbol y sintió una leve punzada de anhelo por ver al crío. En breve, quizá. Todavía quedaba bastante agua en el río. El siluro era difícil de atrapar con tanto calor pero creía saber donde picarían seguro algunas bremas. Aunque solo fuese una tarde a orillas del río. El niño y él, los dos juntos, eso le gustaba, le gustaba responder a sus preguntas..."
https://kansasbooks.blogspot.com/2021/12/padre-e-hijo-de-larry-brown.html
Se me hace raro escribir sobre la fuerte impresión que me ha causado esta novela porque hubo momentos en que tuve que cerrar las páginas, no porque no pudiera seguir leyendo por la incomodidad o por la extrema violencia (que la hay), sino por la inesperada belleza que contienen muchas de sus páginas, la esencia del día a día, de lo que significa la vida en sus pequeños detalles y Larry Brown los hace tan palpables que me llegaron a conmover.
Empecé la novela cuando ya estaba sumergida en La Mansión de William Faulkner, y fue pura casualidad enterarme que ambos autores compartieron lugar de nacimiento. Larry Brown nace en Yocona, Mississippi, cerca de Oxford donde había nacido Faulkner, y esto aunado al hecho de que el protagonista de Padre e Hijo, Glen Davis, acaba de salir de la penitenciaria de Parchman cuando empieza la novela, al igual que Mink Snopes en La Mansión, me revierte al hecho de que hay lecturas que están interconectadas y no planeadas, casualidades. William Faulkner ha sido un autor que me ha volado la cabeza en este 2021, pero reconozco que Larry Brown no se queda atrás. No tiene nada que envidiarle a WF, todo lo contrario, y además he caído rendida a sus pies.
La historia que nos cuenta aquí Larry Brown es la lucha constante y universal entre el bien y el mal, entre la violencia y el ansía de paz. Cuando comienza la novela, Glen Davis acaba de salir de Parchman, la penitenciaria estatal de Mississippi, tras tres años encerrado. Los tres años de reclusión no han hecho demasiado por su paz mental, todo lo contrario, cuando vuelve al hogar, el odio y el rencor latente que lleva en sus carnes desde pequeño pone patas arriba a la familia que le está esperando. No voy a hablar mucho más del argumento porque lo que de verdad aquí interesa es como se va desvelando la vida en el pueblo tras la vuelta de Glen. Hay que leerla sin más datos.
Lo que sí puedo decir es que la novela está conformada de momentos hermosísimos donde la violencia, a veces extrema, se mezcla con un lírismo inesperado, sorprendente: largos viajes en coche de noche o de día, donde el lector es capaz de visualizar el paisaje del Delta o momentos de extrema naturalidad de personajes sentados en el porche de la casa, oyendo los sonidos que se entremezclan en estos silencios y donde quizá un faro del coche que se detiene por unos minutos, hace saltar chispas de tensión dosificada. Larry Brown captura la vida rural como nadie. Sus diálogos son parcos, minimalistas, pero al mismo tiempo están repletos de una humanidad inesperada entre tanta aridez.
Y por otra parte estoy convencida de que el retrato de un personaje como el de Glen, solo puede provenir de un maestro. Glen Davis, un personaje violento, atormentado, casi inhumano, que no deja títere con cabeza y sin embargo llegado un punto, Larry Brown es capaz de infundirle ese retazo de humanidad, ese reconocer por parte del lector que no hay criaturas perfectas y que todos llevamos dentro una vena de oscuridad.
En definitiva, es una novela colosal cuyo texto habla por sí mismo. Atmosférica, contundente, con unos personajes de los que no sobra ni uno, es una novela que me ha llegado al alma. Hay que leerla. Top 2021.
"Virgil identificó el coche de Jewel aparcado bajo un árbol y sintió una leve punzada de anhelo por ver al crío. En breve, quizá. Todavía quedaba bastante agua en el río. El siluro era difícil de atrapar con tanto calor pero creía saber donde picarían seguro algunas bremas. Aunque solo fuese una tarde a orillas del río. El niño y él, los dos juntos, eso le gustaba, le gustaba responder a sus preguntas..."
https://kansasbooks.blogspot.com/2021/12/padre-e-hijo-de-larry-brown.html
neven's review against another edition
4.0
Very solid Southern Gothic, nasty when it needs to be, tender and understanding at other times.
mslaura's review against another edition
2.0
Ratings (1 to 5)
Writing: 3
Plot: 2
Characters: 2
Emotional impact: 2
Overall rating: 2.25
Writing: 3
Plot: 2
Characters: 2
Emotional impact: 2
Overall rating: 2.25
haselrig's review against another edition
4.0
Enjoyed this one quite a bit. A lot of the magic in this book is in the littlest moments. Things that have very little to do with the main thrust of the plot, but are so well done that they stand out.
The other reviews already on-site are going to sum it all up better than I can, but one thing that struck me was that despite being the spring that makes the clockwork of the plot move, I couldn't help feeling that the book might have been stronger if Glen had sat in his prison cell throughout the story. Menace at a remove instead of the jagged tear through all the characters lives that we get. All of Brown's characters seemed strong enough to carry the book themselves with occasional flashbacks of Glen to provide tension and texture. Oh well, not a serious complaint. Just wistful for a second version of the novel to experience a slightly different interpretation of events.
The other reviews already on-site are going to sum it all up better than I can, but one thing that struck me was that despite being the spring that makes the clockwork of the plot move, I couldn't help feeling that the book might have been stronger if Glen had sat in his prison cell throughout the story. Menace at a remove instead of the jagged tear through all the characters lives that we get. All of Brown's characters seemed strong enough to carry the book themselves with occasional flashbacks of Glen to provide tension and texture. Oh well, not a serious complaint. Just wistful for a second version of the novel to experience a slightly different interpretation of events.