by Clyde Edgerton
I just didn't get the point of this book. The characterization is awesome, I must say. The author manages to be in everyone's head almost all the time, and it's not even annoying. It's like an exercise in perspective--take a scene and tell it from ten different perspectives and you'll come up with ten completely different descriptions of what just happened. You don't notice it at first, but it's a clear demonstration of how what we see is so very much colored by who we are...and that's freakish and frightening.
Plot in short: an elderly lady living alone moves through the adventures of her ordinary life with charity and hopeful love for everyone. (Except the bossy lady at church.) It could teach us all a few lessons about how people can be kind and tolerant without sacrificing their principles.
But I still didn't get the point. It was fun meeting the people, especially Mattie--she of the rigid Christian principles, fantastic pound cake, and unrelenting hospitality. But I didn't finish the book smiling, satisfied, or even particularly happy to have read it. I wanted something more...and no idea what.
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