Gilead by
Marilynne Robinson
My rating:
4 of 5 stars
4.0/5.0 - Some books I can fly through, others need to savored, read slowly, and perhaps put aside and read again at a later date. I struggle with literary fiction, I want a book to tell a story, rather than be focused on characters or setting. Gilead is a beautifully written book, in fact, the list of awards it won includes: Pulitzer Prize for Fiction (2005), Orange Prize Nominee for Fiction Longlist (2006), PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction Nominee (2005), Ambassador Book Award for Fiction (2005), Los Angeles Times Book Prize Nominee for Fiction (2004), Chicago Tribune Heartland Prize for Fiction (2005), Rodda Book Award (2006), National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction (2004), Frederic G. Melcher Book Award (2004), Society of Midland Authors Award for Adult Fiction (2005), Grawemeyer Award for Religion (2006). It is written in an epistolary manner, John Ames, at 76, knows his days are numbered. He has a wife, who is half his age, and a beloved young son, who was a gift to him in his old age. Keenly aware that he won't be there to guide his son for much longer, he spends time each day writing in a diary, trying to impart a lifetime of wisdom and guidance. He tells of growing up, the son of a preacher, who was a son of a preacher, of the Civil War and its aftermath, and how that affected his father. He tells of his boyhood, meeting his first wife and losing her in childbirth, and many years later, finding Lila. He speaks of faith, regret, philosophy and theology.
The structure of the book could be off-putting to some, it has no chapters, no clear divisions except some spacing between paragraphs that would indicate the next setting in his writing. One could even say it rambles. This is the first book of the Gilead series, I have previously read
Lila, and will read the others.
Book 226 of 2021
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