<< 1 >>
Rating: 
Summary: Proulx is the Thomas Hardy for our time
Review: Once you read the opening sentence of 'Postcards,' you've made a blood pact to ride it through to the very end. It is a tough journey - tribulations, tragedy, loss and disillusionment. Interestingly enough, all these unfold as America progresses from the 1940s through as close to present day as the novel dares to go.Proulx is an excellent writer -- there is just no other way to say it. Her imagery is accurate and striking, her penmanship sincere and beautiful, her motivation convincing and firm. I am reminded of a modern day Thomas Hardy; indeed, she explores similar themes: man's futile struggle with nature and the land, man's painful grapple with modernization, and the inability to escape fate -- which is often the path Proulx's characters set for themselves through their actions. Proulx takes her time to develop her story, and while this may seem slow at times, she has the luxury of lushly and unabashedly unfolding her story. The attention to detail is impeccable and immaculate -- a story about loss and trudging on needs that, as if searching for an answer in every possible way. This book not only urges its readers to think the author's philosophy -- it's constantly thinking of ways to reveal itself without losing its classy and necessary subtlety. It's enigmatic at times, but take it as an invitation to explore, rather than be put off by it. It's to Proulx's credit that she's taken the exhaustingly explored nostalgic Forrest Gump-esque backdrop of a changing and progressing America to set her story against, and infused it with the possibility of disdaining the fact that our history may be the bane of our existence.
Rating: 
Summary: I have to agree with some others..
Review: this book just didn't do it for me. I haven't read Shipping News yet, and wasn't going to after reading this book. But after reading some other reviews, maybe I will give that a try and it will be better. I sure hope so! I could never figure out who was talking and was confused a LARGE part of the time reading this book on what was going on. I hated reading the postcards at the beginning of a new chapter to find out what was going to happen. I really don't understand the meaning of this book, but am glad for one thing. IT'S OVER!
Rating: 
Summary: A Tough & Worthwhile Read
Review: This book strongly reminded me of Laura Hendrie's "Stygo"--unfortunately out of print--another excellent read that hangs in one's consciousness long after it's finished. "Postcards" has an oddly cinematic quality, being filled with vivid images, most of which may be described as poignantly brutal. While the story pivots on an act of violence (consciously unintentional but nonetheless lethal), it is not a parable of retribution or even contrition; this is not a book about simplistically defined values. It's a book of related vignettes imaginatively organized around a narrative core which tracks the slow disintegration of its protagonist and those whose lives he touches, against the background of a decaying culture. Many questions are left unanswered--many lives are lost, literally and figuratively. In order to fully appreciate this book, it probably helps to have suffered a few serious losses or mistakes in one's own life and to be unencumbered by a misguided optimism that "things always turn out O.K. in the end"--they don't. I'm not exactly sure why I enjoyed the book so much, but it was a real page-turner for me. I agree with previous reviewers who compared it to works by Faulkner & Steinbeck; I also felt the influence of Flannery O'Connor, Harper Lee & Joyce Carol Oates. There's nothing prettified or sentimental about "Postcards"--it's a book that cuts right to the bone in talking about certain varieties of American experience in the last half of the 20th century. It gave me that peculiar thrill we get upon discovering a writer capable of truly penetrating the veneer of culture and individual personality in a fundamentally compassionate way, and that is a powerfully uplifting experience. This is a finely wrought and memorable work I recommend to any serious reader.
<< 1 >>
| 
