Girls, To Thiink This Won The National Book Award!!!!!!!

                                             One might say that "Salvage The Bones" is the greatest Hurricane Katrina novel.  But, then, at this point, it is also the only Hurricane Katrina novel.  It has some gorgeous language, and the chapter on Katrina is the most powerful one in the novel. This depiction of the Batistes, a poor Black family in Mississippi, is given scope by embellishment of all sorts of literary references, from Greek mythology to Faulkner.  And yet, I was not, pardon the expression, blown away.

                                              I found it engaging and absorbing. But I also found myself wanting to know
what the other works of fiction it beat out were.  I mean, "The Art Of Fielding?"  I would have voted for that, in a minute!

                                                There was enough of good writing in the book to make me want to read more of Jesmyn Ward.  But this one just did not do it for me.  The Batistes, while individualistic, and with their own strengths and weaknesses, seemed to be like too many other inhabitants of Southern fiction. Granted, there is a tradition there, but I found myself wanting something more from the story.  That's it.
The book lacked narrative drive.  It had language and characterization, but took too long in building up to Katrina, and, once that was done, you might as well call it quits.  Perhaps "Salvage The Bones" would have worked better as a short novella.  It just seems too padded out, and takes its time in getting where it wants to go!!!!!!!!!!!

                                                Unlike my girls, who are always sure of where they want to go!!!!!!!!!