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A review by savaging
The Changeling by Joy Williams
5.0
Oh here you are. Oh here you are book I always wanted to exist.
Book of animal and God, woman and madness and dirt. And the children! Stripped of sentimentality but full of wild life. Children who "were like drunkards really, determined to talk at great length and with great incoherence." Who are, yes, closer to God, but that should be far from reassuring.
Also: sentences. Whole pages of perfect short sentences. "Outside it was Florida." And other whole pages without sentences, beast-children yipping their chatter over each other.
Note: don't read the introduction. Full of spoilers and the kind of hard-edged analysis that feels at odds with the spirit of the book.
Book of animal and God, woman and madness and dirt. And the children! Stripped of sentimentality but full of wild life. Children who "were like drunkards really, determined to talk at great length and with great incoherence." Who are, yes, closer to God, but that should be far from reassuring.
Also: sentences. Whole pages of perfect short sentences. "Outside it was Florida." And other whole pages without sentences, beast-children yipping their chatter over each other.
Note: don't read the introduction. Full of spoilers and the kind of hard-edged analysis that feels at odds with the spirit of the book.