Author: Craig Lancaster
3.75 out of 5 Stars
Plot Background:
Mitch Quillen is a middle aged man with a very big chip on his shoulder. His marriage is failing, his career has fizzled out; his mother has passed away, and his father is really the only connection to his past and his family that he has left. Following a series of mysterious phone calls from his usually silent father, Mitch decides (with a little push from his wife) to go to Montana to find out what is wrong and to settle the debt he feels his father owes him. When he gets there, he discovers that the problems and miscommunications begin to build up, and what he discovers will change him forever.
My thoughts:
I had mixed feelings on this story. I was torn between 3.5 and 4 stars, so I went with 3.75. I will start with the good elements of this book.
One thing that I loved about the book, is how simply beautifully the book is written. Lancaster has a real talent with words, and the way he constructed his sentences and the words that he used flowed together perfectly. I didn't feel that he dumbed anything down for the reader, and that is something that I respect greatly in him as an author. He didn't over explain things, but he didn't leave the reader wanting more explanations either. I would love to read more of his work, not for the story or plot but just because of how the words seems to have flowed out of him like water into something that was beautiful.
I also liked the character of Mitch. He was like so many people, lost. He felt he wasn't responsible for his happiness-- it was always someone else's fault. His wife's fault for infidelity, his fathers fault for messing up his childhood, his brother's fault for his mothers sorrow. He, like so many others, did not fully take ownership of his life until near the end. I also enjoyed the transformation that his character underwent during the novel. He was merely a dopple-ganger of his former self by the end.
Another thing I liked was that the author didn't overload the book with minor characters. The people that were met or mentioned, were all part of the bigger picture. For the most part, there weren't a lot of minor fluff characters to beef up the story, it was just a raw, simple yet complex story line.
This brings me to my next point, things that made this book not a 4 or 5 star book for me. The plot, while interesting, was a little slow at some points. I kept waiting for something big and terrible to happen to cause such anger and such a rift between Mitch and his father Jim. I thought maybe Mitch was abused, physically or sexually or otherwise, but the only major thing that happened was his father getting drunk and fighting with his ex-wife. Perhaps it is a sad commentary on our society that a drunk argumentative father does not phase me, but I kept waiting for the other shoe to fall so to speak. It was not until the end-- which I will NOT give away here, that I felt truly shocked, and even then it wasn't something Mitch even knew about growing up, so it wasn't something that would have been included in the reason for their rift. I just felt that Mitch was being, well, for lack of better words a whiny baby. I thought to myself "Everyone's parents have had fights, if I didn't talk to my dad just because my parent's fought I'd never have a conversation with him. Mitch needs to grow up and get over it already!" Jim had plenty of reasons to be so broody and distant, but Mitch, well Mitch just seemed annoyingly selfish.
Overall this novel was worth reading. It was serious and dark in the end, but along the way it was a little bit dry and slow, no matter how beautiful and smart the author's words. I would recommend it to anyone who has had issues with their parents in their lives, or if you are looking for a deeper book to read.
Here is a link to the Kindle edition of the book, best of all its only $2.99! And paper copy is only $3.99! You can use the Amazon searchbox for a paper copy on the side of the screen.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Summer-Son-ebook/dp/B003S9WBLG/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1350353962&sr=8-2&keywords=the+summer+son
Happy Reading!!!
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