BACK ROADS by Tawni O'Dell 2000

FIC
O'Dell, T.

This book is strange and not complete successful, in my view. The plot concerns 20-year old Harely, who has been raising his three younger sisters since his mother's incarceration for the murder of his father two years before. He works two jobs, money is tight, and life in general is awful. He loves his sisters, however, and takes seriously his duty to protect them.
He begins an affair with an older woman, the mother of his littlest sister's friend, and that relationship leads to a violent and shocking series of events that reveal the true nature of what has already been described as wildly dysfunctional family.
The story is told in Harely's voice, funny and poetic, and vaguely reminiscent of Holden Caulfield's. It is his voice that makes the book what it is.

THE DIVE FROM CLAUSEN'S PIER by Ann Packer, 2002

FIC

PACKER

In Madison, Wisconsin high school and college sweethearts Carrie Bell and Mike Mayer are having relationship problems - at least Carrie is. Before they can clear the air Mike, trying to win Carrie's attention, foolishly dives into shallow water at a Memorial Day picnic. He is paralyzed. Carrie feels pressure and expectations from all sides: his family, her mother, her best friend, Mike's best friend, Rooster, Mike himself. Carrie finds refuge shut up in her room sewing outfits of her own design. In the middle of one night she leaves and ends up on the doorstep of a high school classmate living in Manhattan. She gets cheap rent and finds romance with an older, emotionally impenetrable man. All this adds to her confusion in her quest both to forgive herself and to embark on a career. As for Mike, you have to read the book!

The Life of Pi by Yann Martel

FIC
Martel, Y.

Sixteen-year-old Pi is on his way from India to a new home in Canada when the ship carrying him, his family, and many of the animals formerly in his family's zoo, sinks. Pi finds himself alone on a 32-man lifeboat with a Bengal tiger named Richard Parker. Time, determination, and Pi's knowledge of animals help him establish a territory the tiger respects. Both the tiger and Pi's faiths-Christianity, Islam, Judaism, and Hinduism-help the two survive a horrific 227 days at sea. When investigators from the shipping company refuse to believe Pi's story, he presents them with an alternate version. Even the executives admit their preference for Pi's original, possibly metaphorical, tale. So it is, Pi points out, with God.

Though Martel takes much time recounting Pi's early history, the patient reader will be rewarded.