Fourth of July Creek

A Novel

De: Smith Henderson

Narrado por: MacLeod Andrews, Jenna Lamia

In this shattering and iconic American novel, PEN prize-winning writer, Smith Henderson explores the complexities of freedom, community, grace, suspicion and anarchy, brilliantly depicting our nation's disquieting and violent contradictions.

After trying to help Benjamin Pearl, an undernourished, nearly feral eleven-year-old boy living in the Montana wilderness, social worker Pete Snow comes face to face with the boy's profoundly disturbed father, Jeremiah. With courage and caution, Pete slowly earns a measure of trust from this paranoid survivalist itching for a final conflict that will signal the coming End Times.

But as Pete's own family spins out of control, Pearl's activities spark the full-blown interest of the F.B.I., putting Pete at the center of a massive manhunt from which no one will emerge unscathed.

Though it can leave the reader bruised

Any additional comments?

Very, very well written. It was hard to turn this one off - because the story took so many twists and turns I was never sure what was going to happen next. It was fairly emotional listening - at times I felt as battered and bruised as the main character - but that's what good writing is all about - engaging the reader - right???

Dark, but very well written

Would you listen to Fourth of July Creek again? Why?

Sure. The colorful similes, metaphors and illustrative writing was a treat to my ears.

Who was your favorite character and why?

Rose. I've got teenagers and remember making all sorts of bad decisions at that age.

What does MacLeod Andrews and Jenna Lamia bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

The Jenna chapters were outstanding. The woman has talent! So does, Andrews. He captured the characters well and was an outstanding narrator. He's no Bronson Pinchot, but he's got chops.

If you could take any character from Fourth of July Creek out to dinner, who would it be and why?

Pete. I like to drink.

Good listen

Good easy listen, sadly it did not make me crave to finish. I still suggest it, it was a good month I took just putting it on in the car

Bleak LIfe in Montana

Any additional comments?

This is a grim book reminiscent of Russell Banks’ brooding books of boyhood in New Hampshire (e.g. Affliction). Told from the perspective of Pete, a Montana Department of Family Services caseworker who himself would be a prime candidate for psychiatric services, the book details the travails of Pete’s broken family, run away prostituted daughter, on the lamb brother and more centrally Jeremiah Pearl and family. Pearl has banished himself to the Montana wilderness on the strength of his wife’s vision of the end of the civilized world. Pete encounters Benjamin Pearl when he wanders into a local school. Jeremiah’s son is in bad shape, undernourished and wearing threadbare clothes – life in the Montana wilderness is no picnic. Jeremiah snatches him back and rejects any assistance from Pete. It is quickly apparent that Pearl is a right wing nutcase though exactly how much his act is composed of real violence and how much bravado is unclear until the book’s conclusion. When confronted with a dinosaur bone Benjamin finds (there are such bones in Montana) Pearl insists the earth is six-thousand years old and that such “evidence” of prehistoric remains are the work of Satan. Typical of survivalists who surround themselves with guns, Pearl believes the dollar is fiat currency that will soon collapse. He drills holes in the heads of presidential coins and dresses them up with minute symbolism including swastikas and ZOG (Zionist Occupational Government). The coins are popular with fellow right wing travelers in the Northwest. The feds move in to try to find Pearl. In their search some are decent but a few treat the locals, including Pete, with disdain and occasional violence lending credence to the arguments of Pearl and his ilk. The book is bleak, no way around that, but the plot holds together with a bit of a conclusion that wraps things up albeit somewhat on the pull it out of the fire before it melts side of things. Pete goes on with his work although his life is shattered and the lives around him are likely only temporarily in tenuous equilibrium.

absolute must read

i can safely say that this has been my favorite book that i have read this year...and probably up there in my top reads in the past few years. this book was so heavy. and so amazing.

what an incredible cast of characters. most of which you rooted for even though they weren't all that 'good' in a conventional sense. there was such a deep sadness that rooted through every single person the story encounters. sadness and despair. each of the families (children) that the main character, Pete, is tasked to help as a social worker are desperate and depressed sometimes depraved.

i don't know what to say. i loved it so much it was one of those books that i never wanted to end.