Cavedweller

Rating:
Summary: What if real life doesn't have a narrative
Review: Tony Earley wrote that he judges his work on its ability to write about the South in a way that reveals its history, its "Christ-haughtedness," and its flavor. He says that he tries to accomplish this while not making the kind of characters that slip into stereotypes -- gun toting, gap-toothed smiling, et al. This is the kind of debate that anyone who reads Southern literature ought to think about. There is a lot of work out there that borders on getting most of its mileage on the creation of Southern characters that stand as symbols.
Dorothy Allison's Cavedweller is decidely not this kind of book. It has plenty of real people with too many quirks to fit within the straightjacket of the Dukes of Hazzard.
The story has the same character structure as "The Poisonwood Bible" -- a mother who tends to a flock of three daughters while an absent father figure strays in the background. In this case, the daughters suffer from too much religion, too much partying, and too much spelunking, respectively. I enjoyed how the book dips into each of their lives for stretches at a time.
This means that all of the figures wax and wane in their significance to the overall narrative of the story. Some times we read about the the mother, other times about each of the daughters. This book probably gains on the Poisonwood Bible in the way that it also has real men, even if they are more minor. Nolan wants to marry the middle daughter, loves to play music, but cannot have both. Delia's first husband has a lot of wisdom about love, even if he learned about its value when he lost it. If this sounds like a lot of disparate paths, that's because this is the kind of book that Dorothy Allison has written. Its a book where lots of struggles cross within one small Georgia town. Most of the struggles could take place in Atlanta or Omaha. Its not just a Southern book, even if it still is coated in Georgia clay dust.
I would recommend this book for book clubs, because it has so many entry points for reflection.

Rating:
Summary: Well written but too sprawling
Review: Years and years ago, I devoured Bastard out of Carolina. Then I got ahold of Cavedweller - and it might as well have dwelt in a cave itself for all the notice I took of it. Why did it take me so long to pick it up and read it?
Answer: the cover photo was ambiguous and didn't draw me in, and the title was...odd.
What a mistake! I picked it up while cleaning out bookshelves a few days ago, flipped to the first page, and barely put it down till I'd finished it. It begins with death, and death (or the threat of death - many near misses) persists throughout. But somehow the women of this book triumph above poverty, narrow-minded neighbors, small town pettiness, Holy Roller invective, no-good men (though, to Allison's credit, there ARE a few good men), and lack of opportunity.
I admire the author's ability to move seamlessly forward in time without her readers demanding to know absolutely everything that happened in the intervening years. Characters grow and learn and change, and Allison's writing plops us down at the critical moments so we can observe first-hand the events that caused the transitions.
Wonderful book, wonderful characters, wonderful writing.
Highest recommendation, right behind Bastard out of Carolina.