Michelle Curie's Reviews > Wildlife

"You have an inquiring intelligence. Everything will always surprise you. You'll have a wonderful life."

Something in me broke while reading this. With less than 200 pages it's short in length, but certainly not on the feelings it evokes. Set in Montana in the 1960s, six-teen year old Joe Brinson has to watch the marriage of his parents fall apart over the course of three days.



There is little said, but a lot felt. Ford has a very particular way of writing: there are no lengthy descriptions, no unnecessary dialogue, no indulging backstories. I'm usually a sucker for some nice wordings, but in this case the simplicity is extremely effective, as it re-creates the growing distance, the sense of sudden unfamiliarity and unsettledness that the characters feel. Watching love die is a big deal, something that we all have witnessed, if not in our own lives than certainly in someone else's and it's a painful matter that is often hard to comprehend. And if you can't make love last, then what is your life worth?

"I wondered if there was some pattern or an order to things in your life - not one you knew but that worked on you and made events when they happened seem correct, or made you confident about them or willing to accept them even if they seemed like wrong things."

I'm surprised some have labeled this as a coming-of-age story. I am not sure if Joe really reaches an important stage of development as the definition would require him to. In a way, it's more an acceptance of the strangeness of life, of how unfathomable it is and will always be - regardless of our age.