The Blue Star
I had gotten turned on to Tony Earley by some earlier posts on BGB, and I read and loved his novel, Jim the Boy. The Blue Star is Earley’s latest novel and continues the story of Jim Glass. Not to get too eloquent on you, but holy crap can Earley write. I loved The Blue Star even more than I loved Jim the Boy, and that’s saying something.
This book picks up when Jim is a senior in high school, still in rural Aliceville, North Carolina, on the brink of World War II. And while there still aren’t any specific things that cause me to relate more closely to our main character, I guess this book resonated even more with me than the first one because of some of the general themes that I think are somewhat timeless — including the idea of the girl that you want but don’t think you can have — as well as my feeling that this book told more of a story than Jim the Boy did (again, no disrespect for that amazing book). I’ve done this before, and I’m going to do it again — here are a few tidbits from the book that I think represent Earley’s gift for language and metaphor:
The weather was still warm — the days mild, the first frost still days or weeks away — but the world seemed bent on practicing for the coming winter.
and
He could feel thousands of words, everything that he wanted to say to her, piled up behind his teeth, waiting for him to open his mouth so they could storm into the light.
and
The fruit trees glittered like fountains whose water had sprung suddenly from the earth, only to freeze before it touched the ground.
I know that’s not much, but those brief snippets, to me, are just examples of prose so perfect that it borders on poetry. I can’t give this book anything less than two thumbs up, and I’d give it more if I had more thumbs.
Update: Previously reviewed on BGB here and here.
November 13, 2008 7:52 am 3 Comments
Other Links to this Post
RSS feed for comments on this post. TrackBack URI
Subscribe
By jim, November 13, 2008 @ 12:46 pm
See, I love that you guys blog about all kinds of books–not just new ones–and even post on ones other posters have reviewed to show a different take. Sounds great. I have the first one, but clearly need to read this one, thanks.
By Tim, November 13, 2008 @ 4:07 pm
Thanks for the thanks, jim. I’ve added links to the previous reviews of this one.
By Jesse, November 18, 2008 @ 2:02 pm
We had Tony Earley on Cover to Cover on GPB Radio back early in the summer and you can hear the interview at http://www.gpb.org/covertocover
I, too, was blown away by the understated genius in his prose. If you’ll remember back to Jim the Boy there was a short chapter at the conclusion of Part I that was totally in italics. It was just an account of the uncles playing baseball with Jim but it was just mesmerizing.
As always, I enjoy the blog.
Jesse