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sausagefeet's review
1.0
I was willing to give this book a chance, even though I don’t usually read child-animal bond books (because the animal always dies at the end in a usually deeply unsatisfying manner) BUT the first chapter introduces the father’s dog whose name is literally the N word. It was a fine story and honestly enjoyable at parts especially when the pig gets a knife thrown into him and the fat man who owns the pig gets viciously attacked by dogs directly after this discovery. However Gipson really flubbed the ending and consequently the entire message of the book. I was like “okay we can overlook the dog’s name, the son will be better.” But the last two sentences bring it back in a terrible gotcha moment when the son decides to name his new dog N*****. Then the book ends. I get that it was a different time/place but it seems like Gipson had this ending in mind the entire time as if it’s some clever racist joke that we should all overlook because it’s ’just a dog’. It’s impossible for me to understand why he would do this or what he accomplished through doing so.
You might think that I’m being overly sensitive or flippant about this, but this book was published in 1947, when Gipson was well into his 30s. He had the PERFECT opportunity to present a generational “growth” moment between father and son, by having the son NOT name his dog the literal N word. The novel is classified as a coming of age story, which should speak for itself on why I feel this way.
I’m not even gonna mention the womanizing and mysoginist undertones present throughout the entire story because it’s unfortunately par for the course when it comes to books written in this era and for this audience (young, impressionable white kids). But the ending royally blew it and, in my opinion, rendered the entire plot useless.
Why should anyone care about this book when there are much better stories (Red Fern Grows, Hatchet, Red Pony, even Old Yeller) that are along the same vein and more substantial? I sincerely feel that this book should be forgotten.
Then again, that’s just my opinion and I understand the intrinsic value of nostalgia some feel for this book. But for me, and probably any reader these days, it’s just not worth it. It almost makes me wish that the dog would die at the end if only to glean a slightly better metaphor for ‘coming of age’ and the inescapable passing of time and continuous progress.
+1 star because the dog does not die at the end, unlike literally any other book ever written around an animal.
-1 star because the dog doesn’t die at the end also and the ending is just a womanizer getting married to some girl he doesn’t even care that much for. A dieu, Gipson. Never again.
You might think that I’m being overly sensitive or flippant about this, but this book was published in 1947, when Gipson was well into his 30s. He had the PERFECT opportunity to present a generational “growth” moment between father and son, by having the son NOT name his dog the literal N word. The novel is classified as a coming of age story, which should speak for itself on why I feel this way.
I’m not even gonna mention the womanizing and mysoginist undertones present throughout the entire story because it’s unfortunately par for the course when it comes to books written in this era and for this audience (young, impressionable white kids). But the ending royally blew it and, in my opinion, rendered the entire plot useless.
Why should anyone care about this book when there are much better stories (Red Fern Grows, Hatchet, Red Pony, even Old Yeller) that are along the same vein and more substantial? I sincerely feel that this book should be forgotten.
Then again, that’s just my opinion and I understand the intrinsic value of nostalgia some feel for this book. But for me, and probably any reader these days, it’s just not worth it. It almost makes me wish that the dog would die at the end if only to glean a slightly better metaphor for ‘coming of age’ and the inescapable passing of time and continuous progress.
+1 star because the dog does not die at the end, unlike literally any other book ever written around an animal.
-1 star because the dog doesn’t die at the end also and the ending is just a womanizer getting married to some girl he doesn’t even care that much for. A dieu, Gipson. Never again.
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