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misslezlee's review against another edition
3.0
Not so much one story as four or five stories intertwined around one character who is not the narrator. Each story has a different setting and feel to it, but always, the one character dictates what happens next. The stories are not linear, but that doesn't really matter.
Three quarters of the way through the novel, when the character's father launches in to a lengthy reminiscence of Dr. Spock's childrearing techniques, I began to wish I'd already finished the book. But mostly, I enjoyed the storytelling and the feel of the episodes. I wanted to use the hot tub they dug out in the wilderness. I remembered traveling around Europe as a student.
Three quarters of the way through the novel, when the character's father launches in to a lengthy reminiscence of Dr. Spock's childrearing techniques, I began to wish I'd already finished the book. But mostly, I enjoyed the storytelling and the feel of the episodes. I wanted to use the hot tub they dug out in the wilderness. I remembered traveling around Europe as a student.
amunden's review against another edition
adventurous
reflective
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
eturzillo's review against another edition
mysterious
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.0
wubledoo's review against another edition
4.0
I really enjoyed this book- growing up in the mountains, you occasionally encounter someone teetering on the brink of hermitdom. I felt the storyline (perhaps with the exception of the lack of contention ofverthe inheritance) was realistic in its complicated emotional landscape. Worth a read.
cmasson17's review against another edition
emotional
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.0
mattstebbins's review against another edition
4.0
Slow in the starting, and likely I'd not have kept on were not so many of the images familiar - of places I've been, of places like those I've visited, of places I'd like to someday be. And then I fell into step with Neil Countryman and remembered a younger me and a friend much like me and saw our conversations in John William Barry - more of them than I'd prefer to remember, so many of them that I'd like to forget - and I was feeling lots of things I'd rather not. So for that, for wearing me out so? Fuck you, David Guterson, fuck you. [4 stars]
jedore's review against another edition
2.0
*Yawn* I instituted my new rule...unless it's somehow making me into a better person, books that crawl along at a snail's pace and bore me to tears (despite technically good writing) get relegated to the donation pile. This one will soon have a new home in my local public library...
matthew_p's review against another edition
4.0
The best of Guterson's work since "Snow Falling on Cedars."
adunten's review against another edition
3.0
the new year's first snow
how lucky to remain alone
at my hermitage
- Matsuo Basho
This is an interesting book to vread in a year when I've also vread [b:Into the Wild|1845|Into the Wild|Jon Krakauer|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1403173986l/1845._SY75_.jpg|3284484] and [b:The Last Season|214091|The Last Season|Eric Blehm|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1440816389l/214091._SY75_.jpg|207260]. These are three stories – two true, one fictional – about three men who chose to make the wilderness their home, and went about it in three different ways.
This story (the fictional one of the three) is simple enough: Our narrator, Neil Countryman (haha the irony), tells us the story of his boyhood friend John William Barry, a filthy rich trust fund kid from old Seattle money who dropped out of college, vanished into the woods, and spent seven years living as a hermit deep in the Olympic peninsula's Hoh rain forest. Being the sole heir of the vast Barry fortune and having no relatives he liked enough, he left Neil, his only friend, the entire sum. Neil got $440 million, and John William got a hermit's hardscrabble existence and lonely death deep in the woods of the Pacific Northwest.
Neil is clearly unsure who got the better deal. He has the wistful air of someone who secretly yearns for the fortitude to choose the kind of life that John William chose, but who knows it's not just the commitment to rough living conditions that puts him off – if he's being honest, it's because he could never handle the solitude of the hermit, the coming face-to-face with yourself night after night when each day's work is done. But he's not sure John William made the right choice either, as he helplessly watched his friend degenerate more with each passing season, until he was so unhealthy he simply... failed to stay alive.
Guterson uses the fictional construct of John William to explore the truth that money and a place in a materialistic society don't necessarily bring happiness... but running away from the money and the society doesn't necessarily bring happiness, either. You can run away from unhappiness all you want, but the simple act of running away from unhappiness won't bring you any closer to happiness.
It's interesting to me to examine the three ways these three men went about it. Randy Morgenson, the subject of The Last Season, didn't so much retreat from capitalist society as simply choose a life near the fringes of it, making a life-long career as a backcountry ranger in the National Park Service. He spent 28 years in a low-paying, low-status job that most people only did for a few summers... but one that allowed the mountains to be his office. And his choice earned him only a modicum of criticism from his family and friends for rejecting a more financially profitable career path.
At the other extreme, we have Chris McCandless, the subject of Into the Wild, who took himself off the map and severed all contact with his family. After living the life of a tramp for a couple of years, he chose to tackle a summer alone in the Alaskan wilderness with laughably inadequate equipment and relatively little in the way of know-how, and got himself killed after four months. McCandless only intended to stay a summer, but he intentionally gambled with his life to see if he could survive in pure man vs. wild fashion, and lost.
Here, we have the fictional character of John William Barry, who in many ways walked a middle ground. Like McCandless, he came from a wealthy, sheltered background where expectations for him to continue the family's financial and social successes were high. A lonely only child caught in the middle of a failing marriage. The family wealth derived heavily from logging, mining, and hydroelectricity projects, which presumably gave the environmentally-minded John William yet another reason to despise it. Like McCandless, he angrily rejected it all, and capitalist society on the whole, as a tawdry distraction from the truly important things in life. Like McCandless, he actively hid from his family, and even took steps to mislead everyone into thinking he had gone to Mexico. And in some ways, you could say his plan was even more extreme than McCandless's, because he had no intention of ever coming back out of the forest once he went in.
But unlike McCandless, John William wasn't deliberately gambling with his life, and he had no qualms about accepting some of the products of industrial society help him with his escape from it. He insisted on excavating his hermit's cave from a limestone bluff with a pickaxe, but he wasn't too proud to stock it with canned goods, white gas canisters, and backpacker's meals to supplement his wild diet, and he had no qualms about accepting semi-regular visits and gifts of food and supplies from his friend Neil, the only other person alive who knew where he was. But in the end, his demise was much like that of McCandless; he just managed to last longer before the wilderness did him in.
how lucky to remain alone
at my hermitage
- Matsuo Basho
This is an interesting book to vread in a year when I've also vread [b:Into the Wild|1845|Into the Wild|Jon Krakauer|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1403173986l/1845._SY75_.jpg|3284484] and [b:The Last Season|214091|The Last Season|Eric Blehm|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1440816389l/214091._SY75_.jpg|207260]. These are three stories – two true, one fictional – about three men who chose to make the wilderness their home, and went about it in three different ways.
This story (the fictional one of the three) is simple enough: Our narrator, Neil Countryman (haha the irony), tells us the story of his boyhood friend John William Barry, a filthy rich trust fund kid from old Seattle money who dropped out of college, vanished into the woods, and spent seven years living as a hermit deep in the Olympic peninsula's Hoh rain forest. Being the sole heir of the vast Barry fortune and having no relatives he liked enough, he left Neil, his only friend, the entire sum. Neil got $440 million, and John William got a hermit's hardscrabble existence and lonely death deep in the woods of the Pacific Northwest.
Neil is clearly unsure who got the better deal. He has the wistful air of someone who secretly yearns for the fortitude to choose the kind of life that John William chose, but who knows it's not just the commitment to rough living conditions that puts him off – if he's being honest, it's because he could never handle the solitude of the hermit, the coming face-to-face with yourself night after night when each day's work is done. But he's not sure John William made the right choice either, as he helplessly watched his friend degenerate more with each passing season, until he was so unhealthy he simply... failed to stay alive.
Guterson uses the fictional construct of John William to explore the truth that money and a place in a materialistic society don't necessarily bring happiness... but running away from the money and the society doesn't necessarily bring happiness, either. You can run away from unhappiness all you want, but the simple act of running away from unhappiness won't bring you any closer to happiness.
It's interesting to me to examine the three ways these three men went about it. Randy Morgenson, the subject of The Last Season, didn't so much retreat from capitalist society as simply choose a life near the fringes of it, making a life-long career as a backcountry ranger in the National Park Service. He spent 28 years in a low-paying, low-status job that most people only did for a few summers... but one that allowed the mountains to be his office. And his choice earned him only a modicum of criticism from his family and friends for rejecting a more financially profitable career path.
At the other extreme, we have Chris McCandless, the subject of Into the Wild, who took himself off the map and severed all contact with his family. After living the life of a tramp for a couple of years, he chose to tackle a summer alone in the Alaskan wilderness with laughably inadequate equipment and relatively little in the way of know-how, and got himself killed after four months. McCandless only intended to stay a summer, but he intentionally gambled with his life to see if he could survive in pure man vs. wild fashion, and lost.
Here, we have the fictional character of John William Barry, who in many ways walked a middle ground. Like McCandless, he came from a wealthy, sheltered background where expectations for him to continue the family's financial and social successes were high. A lonely only child caught in the middle of a failing marriage. The family wealth derived heavily from logging, mining, and hydroelectricity projects, which presumably gave the environmentally-minded John William yet another reason to despise it. Like McCandless, he angrily rejected it all, and capitalist society on the whole, as a tawdry distraction from the truly important things in life. Like McCandless, he actively hid from his family, and even took steps to mislead everyone into thinking he had gone to Mexico. And in some ways, you could say his plan was even more extreme than McCandless's, because he had no intention of ever coming back out of the forest once he went in.
But unlike McCandless, John William wasn't deliberately gambling with his life, and he had no qualms about accepting some of the products of industrial society help him with his escape from it. He insisted on excavating his hermit's cave from a limestone bluff with a pickaxe, but he wasn't too proud to stock it with canned goods, white gas canisters, and backpacker's meals to supplement his wild diet, and he had no qualms about accepting semi-regular visits and gifts of food and supplies from his friend Neil, the only other person alive who knew where he was. But in the end, his demise was much like that of McCandless; he just managed to last longer before the wilderness did him in.