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4.43 AVERAGE
4.43 AVERAGE
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
medium-paced
The more I learn about Tim Burton's early collaborators the more I think that the reason he got really bad suddenly may be that he just stopped working with the talented people who made his movies good. Burton may singlehandedly be one of the best arguments against auteur theory. One of those collaborators was Michael McDowell, an author I sadly was not familiar with until I stumbled across his family epic, Blackwater, and I'm so glad I did because this might be a masterpiece.
To sum up Blackwater is difficult as it follows a large group of people chronicling one family's legacy over half a century and 3 generations. Originally this was published monthly as a series of horror paperbacks with spooky over-the-top covers, but more than most series this feels like a novel that was originally published in a serialized form. It begins with a flood. The town is almost swept away by it, and in the aftermath two men find a young woman trapped in the top of the hotel. Her name is Elinor and she says she came to town because she heard a job had opened up at the local school. There is a job opening there, nobody seems to notice it opened up after the flood and her arrival. All her things were destroyed in the flood, which is really the town's fault, so they don't try to check her credentials. There's other odd things about her too; She talks oddly with gaps as though she learned English by over hearing it, she can plant trees and grow them in days, and when she's in the water she starts to look... different. Before long though she has cemented herself as a integral beloved member of the community and married the man who rescued her.
After that we get a saga following Elinor's time as part of the Caskey family, one that sees her battle Mary-Love, the matriarch of the family, for control, and her efforts to gain financial influence and power. In a way this could be any story of a family in the deep south, except for the show bursts of brutal violence, initiated often by Elinor for arguably understandable reasons, but always exceeding anything close to proportionate. I'm not usually a fan of being overly picky about genre designations, but this is a case where selling this as horror may be disappointing for people. It's got all the requisite ingredients such as ghosts, ancient mansions, and fish monsters, but for the vast majority of the story this is a family drama. What it is though to it's bones is southern gothic.
It's also an absolute success. McDowell's gets the south. Okay, I don't actually know if he does because I DON'T get the South, but he feels like he does. He lived there though. His Deep South is a land of floods and rains destroying and renewing the lands, families that pretend to preserve and protect, but often oppress and choke the life out of the people in them. The prose itself is written less like a spooky story of ghosts and monsters, and more like someone chronicling a history at a distance, wanting to preserve and record the story for the sake of posterity.
But that isn't to say that it isn't soaked with unease and suspense. McDowell fills the story with mysteries and questions, most of which he answers in a way, and none of which he answers directly, but the ending, though low on direct answers, is incredibly satisfying; Ending the story how it began, with a flood washing the town away. This is the kind of book in which the beginning feels distant by the end of it, no matter how quickly you read it, because you've spent half a century with these people watching as they live their live and die, and pass their legacy on.
Not bad for a southern gothic retelling of The Little Mermaid.
To sum up Blackwater is difficult as it follows a large group of people chronicling one family's legacy over half a century and 3 generations. Originally this was published monthly as a series of horror paperbacks with spooky over-the-top covers, but more than most series this feels like a novel that was originally published in a serialized form. It begins with a flood. The town is almost swept away by it, and in the aftermath two men find a young woman trapped in the top of the hotel. Her name is Elinor and she says she came to town because she heard a job had opened up at the local school. There is a job opening there, nobody seems to notice it opened up after the flood and her arrival. All her things were destroyed in the flood, which is really the town's fault, so they don't try to check her credentials. There's other odd things about her too; She talks oddly with gaps as though she learned English by over hearing it, she can plant trees and grow them in days, and when she's in the water she starts to look... different. Before long though she has cemented herself as a integral beloved member of the community and married the man who rescued her.
After that we get a saga following Elinor's time as part of the Caskey family, one that sees her battle Mary-Love, the matriarch of the family, for control, and her efforts to gain financial influence and power. In a way this could be any story of a family in the deep south, except for the show bursts of brutal violence, initiated often by Elinor for arguably understandable reasons, but always exceeding anything close to proportionate. I'm not usually a fan of being overly picky about genre designations, but this is a case where selling this as horror may be disappointing for people. It's got all the requisite ingredients such as ghosts, ancient mansions, and fish monsters, but for the vast majority of the story this is a family drama. What it is though to it's bones is southern gothic.
It's also an absolute success. McDowell's gets the south. Okay, I don't actually know if he does because I DON'T get the South, but he feels like he does. He lived there though. His Deep South is a land of floods and rains destroying and renewing the lands, families that pretend to preserve and protect, but often oppress and choke the life out of the people in them. The prose itself is written less like a spooky story of ghosts and monsters, and more like someone chronicling a history at a distance, wanting to preserve and record the story for the sake of posterity.
But that isn't to say that it isn't soaked with unease and suspense. McDowell fills the story with mysteries and questions, most of which he answers in a way, and none of which he answers directly, but the ending, though low on direct answers, is incredibly satisfying; Ending the story how it began, with a flood washing the town away. This is the kind of book in which the beginning feels distant by the end of it, no matter how quickly you read it, because you've spent half a century with these people watching as they live their live and die, and pass their legacy on.
Not bad for a southern gothic retelling of The Little Mermaid.
dark
medium-paced
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
slow-paced
If you have a place in your heart for Southern lit and horrors unknown then this book is for you. I wish I'd know about Michael McDowell when I was writing my thesis.
dark
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore
Moderate: Racism, Rape, Pregnancy
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
There are times when i forget that this is actually a horror novel. It feels very much like a family drama. Although there are things that happened in this book that gives me the creeps but mostly it read like a family novel.