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A review by sandygx260
Blackwater: The Complete Saga by Michael McDowell
5.0
Back in the 1980's, I read the Blackwater Saga and absolutely loved it—I read it twice. I urged it on my friends. I made the mistake of lending the six book set to a friend who was fired from where we worked and abruptly moved back home to New York. You don't ask a friend who has been fired to return your books.
Over the years, I kept thinking about the series. I finally bit the bullet and paid entirely too much money for a battered set on eBay. The next read proved to be as intriguing and bizarre as I remembered.
Last week I was poking around Kindle books on Amazon and saw that the Blackwater Saga was on Kindle. I snapped it right up and raced through it again.
With the Blackwater Saga, McDowell crafted one helluva of a fascinating Southern Gothic tale. The saga features jealousy, passion, hatred, murder, avarice, and a calculating female river monster who occasionally eats people as the heroine. I have never read anything quite like Blackwater. It feels as if McDowell decided to write a Southern Gothic about a powerful family living in Alabama and threw in a river monster.
When I finished, tears came to my eyes because I wanted more! The ending is powerful.
Now I want ro re-read McDowell's amazing The Elementals, a truly frightening book featuring an abandoned house, heat, and sand. Once you read this book, you'll never regard sand as benign.
I will add this—McDowell was gay. I certainly didn't know this when I read his novels, but now I do see his exploration of "outsider" characters in his novels.
Over the years, I kept thinking about the series. I finally bit the bullet and paid entirely too much money for a battered set on eBay. The next read proved to be as intriguing and bizarre as I remembered.
Last week I was poking around Kindle books on Amazon and saw that the Blackwater Saga was on Kindle. I snapped it right up and raced through it again.
With the Blackwater Saga, McDowell crafted one helluva of a fascinating Southern Gothic tale. The saga features jealousy, passion, hatred, murder, avarice, and a calculating female river monster who occasionally eats people as the heroine. I have never read anything quite like Blackwater. It feels as if McDowell decided to write a Southern Gothic about a powerful family living in Alabama and threw in a river monster.
When I finished, tears came to my eyes because I wanted more! The ending is powerful.
Now I want ro re-read McDowell's amazing The Elementals, a truly frightening book featuring an abandoned house, heat, and sand. Once you read this book, you'll never regard sand as benign.
I will add this—McDowell was gay. I certainly didn't know this when I read his novels, but now I do see his exploration of "outsider" characters in his novels.