MBR Bookwatch
Vol. 19(2), February, 2020
From Diane Donovan’s Bookshelf
In Progress
Catharine Leggett
http://catharineleggett.com
Sowilo Press
9780999491515, $23.00, Paper, $8.99, Kindle
Change comes quickly to neighborhoods and towns – sometimes faster than humans can process, even though time seems to move slowly, for some. In Progress: Stories documents these transition points in the lives of all kinds of ordinary individuals.
One such story, ‘The 401’, follows changes experienced by a teen country girl who longs to blend into the sophistication of city girls rather than being a simple farmer’s daughter clothed in hand-me-downs (a feel that threatens to follow her through her first job and into adulthood).
When she is forced to fight for her life one night, then keeps her assault a secret from her parents and the world, her perspective is altered forever. She’s worked all summer to afford the pretty clothes she once longed for, but she hasn’t bought a thing. All that she’s earned is a terrible realization about the dangers of the outside world – and this changes everything.
In another example, ‘Ruthie and the Big Blue Sky’, Ruthie is a ‘human robot’ checkout clerk who, like a bartender, learns much about the ‘regulars’ who shop at her store. Some reveal nothing and are enigmas, much as she is, herself. When an unusual work opportunity involving a hot air balloon presents itself, Ruthie has the choice of breaking free and flying or remaining in predictable, safe routines.
All stories see their protagonists through change and revelation, and each excels in deeply inspecting environment, perceptions, transition points, and newfound realizations.
Catharine Leggett’s short stories reflect quiet acts of desperation and realization – the kind that mirror life’s progression. Her ability to capture the moments that alter lives and hearts makes these tales special works, indeed, and highly recommended for literary readers who enjoy close psychological inspections of individual lives.
The Way to Go Home
Catharine Leggett
Urban Farmhouse Press
www.urbanfarmhousepress.com
9781988214276, $24.95, Softcover
The Way to Go Home opens with expert horseback rider Buddy Scott’s possibly life-ending injury which leaves him helpless in a remote ravine. As he awaits rescue or death, Buddy reviews his life, considers its possibly ‘ridiculous ending’, and reflects that he could have been a better father, husband, and friend to those around him.
In many ways, The Way to Go Home offers a sharp inspection of end-of-life reconsiderations of alternate pathways, personal failures, and choices that, if made differently, could have resulted in better options. In others, it’s a literary exploration of drifters who move in and out of and affect others’ lives until they finally settle down, there to be changed, themselves, by the demands of life and being tied to one place.
Buddy has often received conflicting messages throughout his life about how he should live, as in his musing over sexual choices which embrace three different perspectives from his mother, father, and uncle: “Why now think of Wes’s rants in the barn as the boys lay on their cots? “The fire that burns in your loins is a sign of weakness: a sin. God condones it only under the sanctity of marriage. God will strike you, punish you, if you indulge in wickedness other than the Godly union between man and wife. Those who are weak and act upon their lusting will be visited by disease that will chew their organs and devour their brains.” His mother put it differently. “Wait for the right girl, Buddy. Share it with her. Honour yourself and your future wife. Save yourself for her. Not everyone does. That’s human. But try. Don’t hate yourself too much if you can’t hold out. No matter what, always be respectful.” What would she say if she knew what he’d just done? With his father out in the barn. “Some have greater drive than others, Buddy. You are the only one who will know how to deal with it. But if you’re going with the ladies of the night, make sure they’re clean. You don’t want to end up with the clap.”
The contrast between these influential viewpoints and Buddy’s own choices are nicely done and create evocative, thought-provoking descriptions about the wellsprings of not just individual choice, but evolving ideas on how to interact with others.
At each stage of Buddy’s life, these early influencers and their admonitions are explored as he absorbs conflicting messages, picks those which resonate with his nomad inclinations, and eventually comes full circle to settle down in a revised fashion. His brother has made a good life for himself…perhaps better than his own. This and other observations provoke him to further reflections about the course of his life: “Ray’s visit would pick away at him. He’d go over and over it and he wouldn’t be able to leave it alone.”
Under Catharine Leggett’s observational pen, characters, setting, and options come alive. Buddy now has all the time in the world to reflect, until something changes. He’s always thought he deserved what happened to him in his life. In the end, now, he’s not so sure. The central event that changes everything is slowly revealed in a series of scenes that build to a satisfying crescendo of self-realization and discovery.
The Way to Go Home is all about reaching through time to reconsider trauma and its lasting influences. As the story winds through Buddy’s world, readers will find it a literary work packed with history, changing perspectives, and characters that live and breathe with a sense of reality that’s too rarely seen in fiction but which is more than alive and kicking, here.