Wednesday, August 26, 2009

Eureka!

Having recently finished reading Junot Diaz's The Brief Wonderous Life of Oscar Wao I've been left to cast about for another book holding language that sizzles. I picked up Driftless by David Rhodes--a fine book, yet I set it down with my itch unscratched. Last night, however, restlessly searching my bookshelves, I found a copy of Barry Hannah's novel Yonder Stands Your Orphan and I was off to the word races! As I am only a few pages into the book I have no summation to offer, but I can offer my enthusiasm for Hannah's craft. As the poet Charles Simic remarks, " Hannah is the only novelist whose sentences I keep underlining and underlining..."
Guess I'll read with pen in hand!

2 comments:

anno said...

OK. You're the second person to recommend Barry Hannah. I tried Tennis Handsome, and just couldn't get through it; found myself missing the story in all the words. Maybe I should give Yonder Stands Your Orphan a try...?

Acedog said...

Well, he does have that Southern writing gene that truly revels in verbosity. That has put me off before, yet I find if I can drink in long draughts of his prose it helps. Of course, you might want to try his debut volume of short-stories entitled Airships. A modern classic...