REVIEW OF #63 WHERE THE CRAWDADS SING

 Review by Tom Wells

When I was a high school freshman, my English teacher gave us a lesson on the five elements of a story: Plot; Theme; Character; Conflict; and Setting. The last may seem like the least essential, but it’s what sets this book apart. “Crawdads” is the first effort at a novel by 70-year-old Delia Owen, a zoologist who lived most of her adulthood in Africa and wrote with her husband three books about the flora and fauna of the savannah.  Now she’s struck out on her own and managed to parlay her academic background into the evocation of a Setting that could not be less savannah-like: a humid, spongey marsh on the North Carolina outer banks. She immerses the reader in the smell and the taste and the feel of her created world, one where characters of extraordinary intelligence, kindness and determination prevail over ignorance, privilege and cruelty. Yes, it’s a place that could only exist in fiction, but it’s one I loved smelling, tasting, feeling and being in. 

****½

JFDI #63 WHERE THE CRAWDADS SING Delia Owens

 

WHERE THE CRAWDADS SING

Delia Owens

A first-time novel by a 70 yr old botanist that tells the story of a young girl who survives a traumatic childhood on her own living in a North Carolina marsh. A triumph of grit and determination against the odds. 

REVIEW OF #62 THE BOYS IN THE BOAT

 REVIEW BY TOM WELLS

How could a book about the 1936 US Olympics rowing team be one for our current Covid times? It’s about long training sessions in cold, wet weather. It’s about the physics of rowboats and their rowers. It’s about a sport that these days mostly gets attention every four years. But it’s also about a boy, kicked to the curb by his father and step-mother, who manages to stay in school while working a minimum-wage job, get accepted to the University of Washington at a time when 10% of pupils went on to higher education and there excel at a sport in which he has no prior training while working a summer job building the Grand Coulee Dam in conditions that make you think, yes, Health & Safety does have a vital social role. It’s also about the plucky underdog triumphing over those holding all the cards. And it’s about defeating fascists, if only in a boat race. So why is it relevant to current Covid times? Because anyone who thinks he/she has it tough needs to read it and reflect. 

*****

JFDI #62 THE BOYS IN THE BOAT-David James Brown

 

THE BOYS IN THE BOAT

David James Brown

An inspiring true story of the University of Washington crew who won the 1932 Olympics against all the odds.