True Cross TR Pearson 9781520414256 Books
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A satire of small-town southern mores featuring Paul Tatum (Ray's cousin), introduced in Blue Ridge.
True Cross TR Pearson 9781520414256 Books
In working my way through T. R. Pearson’s 13 novels, I have now finished his ninth, True Cross (2003). This is another of Pearson’s satirical, hilarious dissections of the denizens of a small backwater Virginia town.“The bulk of the local rhetorical eloquence,” writes Pearson, “seemed to have gone to Thomas Jefferson, leaving the rest of the population to descend from the sorts of people given to phlegm manipulation and bouts of inarticulate rage.”
Narrated by Paul Tatum, a feckless and failing accountant who prepares “creative tax returns” for those intent on evading IRS audits, the story centers on Stoney, Tatum’s next-door neighbor, a local jackleg handyman and jack-of-all-trades.
The best-drawn character in the novel, Stoney discovers that he bears a spooky resemblance to the hero in Carpaccio’s famous 16th-century masterpiece St. George and the Dragon—a revelation that inspires him to become a knight errant whose mission is to alleviate the sufferings of mankind and rescue damsels in distress.
The plot thickens when Paul and Stoney learn that Maud Hooper, a comely and willowy woman, is being abused by her domineering husband, Douglas, a rich man who has shadowy connections with the New York City mafia.
Goaded to action by Tatum, and inspired by his (Stoney’s) Messiah complex, Stoney sallies forth to right the wrongs as he sees them, an ill-advised moral crusade that ends in tragedy.
As usual in his narratives, Pearson indulges in (seemingly) trifling tangents, so that we all but lose the thread of his disquisitions. After many digressions and rabbit chasings, however, the plot finally reaches its unsettling goal.
Although True Cross is not Mr. Pearson’s best work, it contains enough of his trademark hilarious hi-jinks and satirical portraits of his characters’ quirky idiosyncrasies to evoke numerous laughs.
I may have been dozing, or simply am dense, but I have yet to discover what the title “True Cross” means.
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True Cross TR Pearson 9781520414256 Books Reviews
T. R. Pearson is the absolute master of the rhythms and speech of
the small-town south. A Short History of a Small Place is his best
work, and ranks among the greatest American fiction of the 20th
century. There are other great Southern writers such as Faulkner
and Eudora Welty, but Pearson is the only one I know of who is able
to capture the folksy gossip that takes place at the small-town
general store. His writing is whimsical and lyrical, and the turns
of phrase will keep you smiling "Kenny, his name was, and he sort
of worked at a local muffler shop, a shabby unfranchised enterprise
on the rise behind the Sinclair where they never stocked your
muffler exactly but carried one they could make fit. They knew
inordinate need for mallets and main force, bent tailpipes with
their knees..." Which sounds like many places I know, but I
couldn't phrase it that well.
The novel is a narrative from Paul Tatum, who works as an
accountant, helping people with taxes and the like. He offers
reflections about various townspeople he knows, their oddities
and eccentricities. These are small-town peculiarities, the kinds
of things that you'd actually see in a small town--no axe murders
and such that too many novelists seem to feel are essential to
make a story interesting.
Pearson is always at his best in the southern small town. In this
novel Tatum visits Venice in Pearson's novel Blue Ridge, some
of the story took place in New York. Such visits to urban sites
don't seem to work as well for Pearson--a bit like Michael Jordan
trying his hand at baseball, although Pearson in an urban setting
is vastly superior to Jordan on a baseball field. The ending is
rather downbeat Pearson has worked murders into several novels
Cry Me a River, Blue Ridge, and Off for the Sweet Hereafter, but
it doesn't work quite as well here. Still--Pearson is always
worth reading, and it's a fine novel.
I liked this book, but only after I'd learned how to read it.
For me, 'True Cross' would've worked far better as a collection of short stories rather than a novel, due to the author's rambling, tangential writing style. I began reading the book as if it were a "normal," straightforward novel with a coherent narrative, and I soon found myself unable to follow it, for all its meandering from the central story. Once I got the hang of it, however, I did like the book's humor, wit, and perceptiveness. There were some instances of truly great prose and turns-of-phrase, as well (though I did find the author's long-winded writing to sometimes work against the book, too, instead coming off as awkward and overwritten rather than substantial in any way). Sadly, by the time I'd navigated through the book's many confusing tangents, I'd completely lost track of the story and its relevance -- yet, I did laugh, quite often, and so I would brand this book as a success in a sense, warts and all.
So, a big thank-you to the book's author and publisher. I am grateful for your work.
An odd shaggy dog story, often laugh outloud funny in the usual Pearson manner. And then it occurred to me the ending, if not the whole thing, was a sort of banal Hannibal Lector spoof, with the victim the yokel and the perpetrators both the langourous female and the yokels' romantic and peckerish imaginations. Try the ending with that in mind.
The pace of this book is incredibly slow, but if you're a fan of dry humor as I am, you'll enjoy it.
In working my way through T. R. Pearson’s 13 novels, I have now finished his ninth, True Cross (2003). This is another of Pearson’s satirical, hilarious dissections of the denizens of a small backwater Virginia town.
“The bulk of the local rhetorical eloquence,” writes Pearson, “seemed to have gone to Thomas Jefferson, leaving the rest of the population to descend from the sorts of people given to phlegm manipulation and bouts of inarticulate rage.”
Narrated by Paul Tatum, a feckless and failing accountant who prepares “creative tax returns” for those intent on evading IRS audits, the story centers on Stoney, Tatum’s next-door neighbor, a local jackleg handyman and jack-of-all-trades.
The best-drawn character in the novel, Stoney discovers that he bears a spooky resemblance to the hero in Carpaccio’s famous 16th-century masterpiece St. George and the Dragon—a revelation that inspires him to become a knight errant whose mission is to alleviate the sufferings of mankind and rescue damsels in distress.
The plot thickens when Paul and Stoney learn that Maud Hooper, a comely and willowy woman, is being abused by her domineering husband, Douglas, a rich man who has shadowy connections with the New York City mafia.
Goaded to action by Tatum, and inspired by his (Stoney’s) Messiah complex, Stoney sallies forth to right the wrongs as he sees them, an ill-advised moral crusade that ends in tragedy.
As usual in his narratives, Pearson indulges in (seemingly) trifling tangents, so that we all but lose the thread of his disquisitions. After many digressions and rabbit chasings, however, the plot finally reaches its unsettling goal.
Although True Cross is not Mr. Pearson’s best work, it contains enough of his trademark hilarious hi-jinks and satirical portraits of his characters’ quirky idiosyncrasies to evoke numerous laughs.
I may have been dozing, or simply am dense, but I have yet to discover what the title “True Cross” means.
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