i am reading a book that is breaking my heart. you know good literature, visceral wordsmithing, when you snap the book shut saying "enough!", hurt but not fully understanding why. perhaps it has touched a rusty old chord that aches when strummed. how did this Karen Russell, this young woman with the haunting insight, get this entry into my mind? where the hell did this book come from?
Swamplandia! is a beautiful and dangerous voyage that navigates grief, sibling love, family fidelity and shame that takes you into the same uncharted territory that Ponce de Leon entered when searching for the Fountain of Youth in the primordial swaps of Florida. here's a taste:
"Somehow I had worked it out in my mind to where I could believe in our mother without having to believe in ghosts exactly. In fact, I was discovering all sorts of beliefs and skepticisms turning like opposite gears inside me, and little drawers of hopes and fears I had forgotten to clean out. Sometimes while wandering around the park I'd catch myself praying in an automatic way, like a sneeze, that my dead mom's blood test results would come back okay."
ouch.
