|
Pif Magazine
Pif Magazine |
Reap
In much fiction depicting rural life, characters are either portrayed as bumpkins and caricatures of actual human beings (in other words, those in the suburbs or cities), or else they are exalted as stoic and noble. In Reap, Eric Rickstad's striking debut novel, the characters wend between these stock approaches, much as they negotiate the difficult, unyielding terrain of northern Vermont that they live in. The focal point of the story is Jessup Burke, an idling sixteen-year-old who has left school and puts off getting a job. Not that the town he lives in gives him many options, of course. The poverty of the logging town gives him an excuse to wander the woods and fish. His languidness is interrupted when Reg Cumber gives him a ride back to town in his black El Camino. Reg is a petty vagrant whose main source of income is from growing marijuana deep in the secret recesses of the rugged forest. It is a family business; Jessup soon meets Hal, the serene older brother confined to a wheelchair, and Marigold, the younger sister. Marigold is caught in a loveless marriage with Hess, who is even more of a miscreant than Reg. Jessup's father died before he was born and, in increments, he gets entangled in the Cumber family. It's not until this point that Jessup realizes he's been desperate for a father figure all his life. Even one as seriously flawed as Reg will do. When Hal and Reg take Jessup to the fair, they readily get the boy drunk and stoned, and then meander to the freak shows. The experience is a sensory overload for Jessup:
The first half of the novel is slow going, taking a more meditative pace in exploring Jessup's coming of age. But then Reg stumbles — by quesitonable means - on a marijuana crop that is too large and lucrative to move without assistance. The second half of the novel is a whirlwind, as Jessup becomes more embroiled in both Reg's plan to cash out and Marigold's increasing sexual frustration. Though nearly twice his age, she sets her sights on the "sweet boy," even as her husband Hess sets his crosshairs on Jessup for the same reason. Reap bumbles occasionally in its pacing as it funnels towards inevitable violence, but this is a minor fault compared to the deft handling of material and characterization. What is perhaps most invigorating is Rickstad's prose, lush and yet brackish, mimicking the Vermont landscape itself. A minimalist approach — common enough in fiction depicting rural life — would have hurt the novel's whip-smart sensibilities. Rickstad's observations of the natural world show a keen eye and yet also a hyperkinetic energy, as if a Reservoir Dogs-era Tarantino decided to film a nature documentary: "An owl lifted from a splintered larch limb, coasted silently above the road, predator's eyes searching remnants of a stone wall for careless mice." Ask people what they know about Vermont and they are likely to mumble something about Ben and Jerry's Ice Cream, maple syrup, or neo-hippiedom. Rickstad, however, shatters these easy myths of "country living," and writes a fascinating story of a region that is both brutal and sensual. Tell us what you think. Email talkback@pifmagazine.com Want Pif to review your book? Alan DeNiro's book reviews have appeared in Gadfly, Rain Taxi, and Virginia Quarterly Review. He is the editor of Taverner's Koans and his own poetry and fiction has appeared in Fence, Willow Springs, Cimarron Review, and previously in Pif Magazine. |
|||||||
