Snake
June 13th, 2003by Kate Jennings
ISBN: 0316912581
There isn’t a right side and a wrong side in this book: circumstances are what they are, and what happens in this story is the result of limited options and misunderstood choices.
The story is about Rex and Irene, who marry young, have two children, live on a farm, and have their lives together disintegrate. Jennings’s story isn’t a blow-by-blow account of marital demise. Instead, in extremely short chapters (none more than a few pages long, many only a paragraph or two) Jennings gives the reader salient emotional details instead of a steady chronology.
The brief, photo essay-like narrative keeps the story sharp, immediate, and engaging. Jennings is a poet (as in she published poetry, I’m being literal here) which could be why she makes such economical use of her words. I read this book in an afternoon. It is the kind of thing that pulls you in and you don’t have to put down until you finish it, in fact it may be better that way, because the pull of the narrative is more emotional than linear.
I didn’t really like the chapter titles. I suppose Jennings was going for clever, for another layer of meaning when she wrote them. Sometimes this worked, and sometimes I just didn’t get them and found them a bit distracting.
Botton line: unusual format, a quick read with a decent emotional punch.
