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Heading Out to Wonderful
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Heading Out to Wonderful
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Heading Out to Wonderful
Ebook331 pages4 hours

Heading Out to Wonderful

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

3.5/5

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About this ebook

A “deliciously dark and dangerous” novel of love and tragedy in post-WWII Virginia by the #1 New York Times–bestselling author of A Reliable Wife (O, The Oprah Magazine).

It is the summer of 1948 when a handsome, charismatic stranger, Charlie Beale, recently back from the war in Europe, shows up in the town of Brownsburg, a sleepy village nestled in the Valley of Virginia. All he has with him are two suitcases: one contains his few possessions, including a fine set of butcher knives; the other is full of money. A lot of money. He’s searching for a home. What he finds is love. And what happens then will haunt Brownsburg for generations.

Heading Out to Wonderful is a “tale of doomed love [that] resonates like a folk ballad, with the language of the Blue Ridge Mountains and its people giving this novel its soul . . . Like any good ballad, the narrative builds slowly to its violent climax, packs an emotional punch, and then haunts readers with its quintessentially American refrain” (Publishers Weekly).
LanguageEnglish
Release dateJan 15, 2013
ISBN9781616202729
Author

Robert Goolrick

Robert Goolrick is the author of the novels A Reliable Wife (a #1 New York Times bestseller, licensed in 30 territories) and Heading Out to Wonderful, and the memoir The End of the World as We Know It.

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Rating: 3.67543855 out of 5 stars
3.5/5

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  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    The premise of this book sounded interesting: a man comes to a small town and no one knows who he is or where he's from. As the townspeople start to open up to him, Charlie Beale becomes integral to their lives, including an involvement with a woman, and things are downhill from there. The writing is straightforward, not beautiful yet not sparse. Still, the first portion of the book was so much backstory, with little to no action or emotions, that I wasn't sure I would make it through. Nothing really stood out for me, but every time I decided to stop reading, I'd come back to it. I had to know what happened with Charlie and the woman. This book is worth sticking with. I had several options in mind for how the story would play out, and the actual ending was none of them. The emotions are more prevalent in the second part of the story, and the characters seem more real.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Robert Goolrick is a great writer he knows how to turn a phrase and his descriptions are always lush. I read the Reliable Wife when it first came out it was an odd story but well written and a book that stuck with me much longer than I expected it to and I actually liked The Reliable Wife the longer I was away from it and I think this one may end up the same way. So, I had high hopes for this book expecting and getting Goolricks fantastic writing but the story was a much slower simmer than I expected it to be, it made me sit on the edge of my seat not from the story really, but in the waiting for the other shoe to drop, you just know something bad is coming.I am not sure how I felt about Charlie dragging this little boy along with him on his trysts, I don’t understand why he took him along it’s not like it was his child. I think what he put the little boy through was worse than anything else Charlie did. Another story from this author that I think will stick with me awhile and probably will end up liking more the farther away I am from it. But I think that is the genius of Goolrick he is an amazing writer but his books are never easy but they will touch you and stay with you even if you didn’t totally love the book.Norman Dietz is the narrator of this one and I’m just not sure what I thought of him; all of his voices sounded like old men, including the little boy and the women. But he fit the book well, so I am not saying he was awful it was just his variations on voices weren’t that different. I hope that makes sense. If you haven’t read Goolrick’s biography – “The End of the World as we Know It” you won’t see how biographical Goolrick’s work is. I think to really “get” his fiction you should read his biography.3 ½ StarsI received this book from Audiojukebox Solid Gold Reviewer Program for a fair and honest review
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Russian playwright Anton Chekhov famously said that if you place a loaded gun on the mantle in the first act, the gun had better go off or there was no purpose in the gun being there in the first place. (I acknowledge that this is a gross paraphrasing but the truth behind the statement is intact.) Robert Goolrick has obviously internalized this maxim and uses it to impressive effect in his latest novel, Heading Out to Wonderful.Charlie Beale is a stranger to the small, peaceful Virginia town of Brownsburg when he arrives with his truck, his set of butcher knives, and a suitcase full of cash. He starts by camping out by the river and deciding if this closed and somewhat xenophobic place is where he wants to put down roots now that he's back from fighting in WWII. And strangely enough, he does want to stay in this place that is initially less than welcoming, asking local butcher Will Haislett to hire him on, buying up land and eventually a house, and befriending Will and his wife Alma's five year old son Sam along the way to winning over the rest of the town.Charlie, nicknamed Beebo by Sam, seems to have no past, at least no past he's willing to share, but he is a decent man and finds himself being folded into the life of the town, accepted and liked by everyone. And everything seems wonderful until he spies the beautiful, teenaged Sylvan Glass with whom he is instantly captivated. Unfortunately, Sylvan is married to the town's wealthiest and meanest man, Boaty Glass, who essentially bought his child bride, bringing her from her poor, hardscrabble existence in a mountain holler to be his trophy in a town not quite willing to accept her. Charlie, as another outsider, falls hard for Sylvan and although at times she seems almost diffident about him, they are fated and their inevitable ending was written the first time Charlie clapped eyes on her.Goolrick has created a masterfully atmospheric novel here. Even before any conflict occurs and everything is seemingly perfect in this fictional world, there is an undercurrent of menace and foreboding, a dark intensity to the tale that makes the reader alert to the cracks in the facade of innocence and idyll. Narrated sixty years on from the main events of the tale by Sam, who was present for more of the story than anyone else in the book besides his beloved Beebo, this is a novel of desperate love, betrayal, mystery, and obsession. Charlie remains a cipher throughout the novel but even so he charms the reader as much as he charms the inhabitants of Brownsburg. Sylvan is distant and lonely and trapped by her past. Her method of coping, through fashion and the movies, is pitiable. The important secondary characters are intriguing, especially in the ways they face the main plot development. And what an unexpected development it is! Goolrick leads the reader, ratcheting up the tension slowly but steadily, as things between Charlie and Sylvan get more and more complicated, even as they are always bound and governed by outside forces, until the final shocking denouement, a plot twist that threatens to unravel much of the town. Richly detailed and completely engrossing, there is no doubt from the beginning that the book cannot contain a happily ever after. That gun casually placed on the mantle must go off. And Goolrick's aim here is nothing but true.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    By the same author of "A Reliable Wife" who has written just as compelling and strong a book as that one in telling the story of Charlie Beale who arrives in his pick-up, two suitcases to his name and a set of butcher knives, and nothing else, in the small Virginia town of Brownsburg that nestles in the foothills of Appalachia. Filled with a longing he can’t identify, he puts down roots, camping by the Maury River, bathing in its waters, and sleeping under the stars.Brownsburg is filled with good people, including Will, the butcher, his wife, Alma, the Latin teacher at the one school, and their young son, Sam, who loves baseball and comes to worship Charlie after he sees him play at the annual Methodist oyster festival.But even an idyllic Eden has its snake. Harrison Boatwright Glass (Boaty) is obese, mean, greedy, and married to the beautiful mountain girl. Sylvan, whom he bought from her parents for a couple thousand dollars and a new tractor when he was 48 and she was 17. Then, one day, Sylvan goes to the butcher shop to see for herself who the new man in town is. She’s dressed like a movie star down to the sunglasses and so beautiful that Charlie is dumbstruck. It takes one encounter in the butcher shop for Charlie’s life to change. Another encounter at the oyster festival in the presence of Sam for Charlie and Sylvan to know they’re destined to become lovers, and less than a year for it all to end in tragedy.The fragility of wonderfulness, the dire consequences that comes to people who dream and believe their reality can be like what they see in the movies, and the nature of man – even good men – is the nature of sin are Goolrick’s themes – ones he revisits from "A Reliable Wife."The novel is beautiful, written in lyric haunting prose; the story is simply and straightforwardly told, inexorable is a better word. Goolrick is a master at revealing how forbidden love is so powerful that it can twist a soul and change a person into someone unrecognizable, especially to themselves.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Heading Out to Wonderful. Robert Goolrick. 2012. Goolrick also wrote The Reliable Wife which I enjoyed to a certain extent. And I feel the same way about this book: it is readable and suspenseful but it is not a great novel. The plots of both of them involve wonderful love stories that are doomed from the beginning and are mired in violence and adultery. This book is beautifully written. I guess it would have been too much like a Walton’s Mountain story if our character had fallen in love with a married woman. You know from the beginning that this story will not end well, but you keeping and hoping.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I read this right after finishing Goolrick's first book, A Reliable Wife. This one was just as well written. Very nuanced characters, none of whom are perfect and all of whom are reaching for something more in their lives. The fact that the something more is really just a little happiness makes it all the more compelling.
    The event that ends the story of the two lovers wasn't entirely to my liking. Not because I don't like what happened; I'm just not sure it was the right move for these characters. Perhaps with more reflection on the small town community, which can be overly familiar, I will change my mind. But the final event was abrupt in terms of storytelling. Then again, violence of this type always is abrupt, so perhaps I was too influenced by the pace of the story to be prepared for the final event.
    At any rate, another excellent novel from Goolrick.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5

    Spoiler Alert....
    I am relieved to have read the last page and closed the book. My anxiety increased as I turned each page. I became more and more uncomfortable until I realized that given the passion, place and time there could only be one viable ending. This story and it's telling evoked thoughts and emotions I would have preferred to keep buried. The greater tragedy is that this fictitious town in Virginia in 1948 had a real life counterpart in 1972.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I loved A Reliable Wife, Goolrick's previous book. There are almost the same number of one star reviews as there are five stars on Amazon.com for it. It seems to be a book people either love or hate. While I really enjoyed A Reliable Wife, Heading Out to Wonderful is a book I just kinda liked. After reading A Reliable Wife I tried to catch Robert Goolrick at the Miami book fair this past November where he was promoting this book. Alas, too many authors and too little time so we never crossed paths. I would have loved to have gotten my copy of A Reliable wife signed but in retrospect I am glad I didn't shell out the hard cover price of this book. In the end it was better for my pocketbook and overstuffed book shelf that I just checked it in and out of the library. Although A Reliable Wife is allotted a permanent place on my shelf this was just a pass through.In Heading Out to Wonderful, we have Charlie who returns from war and insinuates himself into a small Virginia town. This town is a perfect slice of Americana pie. Everyone knows everyone and they have town oyster festivals and it's wholesome and all that good stuff. Charlie is adopted as a de facto member of the butchers family and he goes about his day cutting up the best cuts of meat anyone has ever eaten and charming the socks off the lady folk. Everything is rolling along until one day in walks Sylvan Glass. She is the teenaged bride of Boaty Glass which is a rather apt name since he is roughly boat sized. When Boaty was in his forties he decided to find himself a bride so he "bought" Sylvan from her dirt poor family and whisked her away to a loveless marriage. Sylvan longs for Hollywood glamour but she is stuck in a hick town. Sylvan and Charlie try to escape their circumstances by starting a relationship with each other. Charlie even tries to incorporate the butcher's young son Sam into his fantasy family. As Charlie becomes more involved in his obsession for Sylvan he become oblivious to the people around him that he is hurting, especially Sam. When Sylvan and Charlie's star crossed love finally explodes the people in the town will be left to suffer the consequences and pick up the pieces.This book reminded me of an Appalachian murder ballad. If you know anything about them you know they don't end well and tend to be rather depressing. I think I was missing some feeling of hope from this book. Even so the story was still beautifully told and I was left with a longing for small town life. Even though the story followed a predictable path I enjoyed it and would pick up Goolrick's subsequent books.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I loved Goolrick's first novel, A Reliable Wife. This second novel, Heading Out to Wonderful, was almost impossible for me to put down -- it combines a plot that really moves along, gorgeous writing, and great character descriptions. For me, a truly unforgettable novel.How Goolrick gives us a sense of time and place, and the mood (pages 8-9 of my trade paperback edition):"Children remember summer best; they feel its pleasures on their skin. The older you get, it's the winters that stay with you, down deep in your bones. Things happen in the winter. People die in February.Children remember staying up late. Grownups think about getting up early.A particular town, then, Brownsburg, in a particular time and place. The notion of being happy didn't occur to most people, it just wasn't something they thought about, and life treated them pretty well, and even though at least two or three men got drunk every week night and slapped their wives and children around and children were punished hard when they were rude or misbehaved, the notion of being unhappy didn't occur much either."
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Charlie Beale comes to Brownsburg Virginia where he becomes the butcher's assistant and friend, and becomes a second father Will,the butcher's, son Sam. He falls in love with Sylvan, Boaty's wife and eventually she accuses him of rape at her husband's instigation. Very convoluted and sometimes confusing, but characters are well developed.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    A Reliable Wife was so startling that it was unlikely the sophomore effort would equal it, but this was a worthy summer read. The vivid word pictures of the Virginia setting after WW II is more riveting than the mysterious male lead and the female main character is pretty unlikeable despite her unusual background. Too much emphasis on physical beauty, as in the first one. But give it a try for the descriptions of beautifual country that is surely a lot harder to find now.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    A beautifully written novel that I've heard some people say reminds them of an old folk ballad. It's beautifully sung and skillfully realized but you know it's going to end in tragedy. I've had the privilege of meeting Mr. Goolrick when A Realiable Wife was first released in paperback. He is a great guy and so honest about his writing. Absorbing characters and an involving story make this book a must...especially for reading groups. Can you tell how much I like it?
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    It does not happen as often for me anymore as I would wish, but every so often, I can completely lose myself in a book. I live in a different place or time for two or three days and find myself wishing I could return to the book even when the real world is calling for my attention. Robert Goolrick’s Heading Out to Wonderful is one of those special books for me.Set in rural Virginia in the summer of 1948, Heading Out to Wonderful is the story of Charlie Beale, a World War II veteran who arrives in little Brownsburg carrying everything he needs to start a new life: one suitcase full of money, and another containing a complete set of high-quality German butcher knives. Soon enough, Charlie decides that Brownsburg is exactly the “wonderful” place he is searching for and has talked the local butcher into giving him a job. After he is taken under the wing of Alma, the butcher’s wife, and has demonstrated his superior meat-cutting skills, the locals accept him as a welcome addition to their community.Life is good for Charlie Beale. He is much admired by everyone for his skills in the shop and on the baseball diamond, and has formed a special bond with Sam, Alma and Will’s five-year-old son. He even owns a house and has fully furnished it, with Alma’s help, via farm and estate auctions around the county. But all is not as it seems, and that becomes obvious on the morning that the beautiful Sylvan walks into the butcher shop and eyes Charlie Beale for herself.Sylvan is married to “Boaty” Glass, the wealthiest man anywhere around Brownsburg. The contrast between “Boaty” and his wife could not be greater. On the one hand, Boaty is a middle-aged fat man with a reputation for ruthlessness and condescending ways towards everyone else in town. On the other, Sylvan is a striking beauty still in her teens that “Boaty” treats more like a possession than a wife. All Charlie knows is that he has to have Sylvan for his own – and that he is going to make that happen no matter what it might cost him or the town.From the moment Charlie first sees Sylvan, the reader feels increased tension in the air, a sense of the impending doom Charlie decides to ignore. Goolrick has perfectly recreated a world (that to a lesser degree probably still exists in deeply rural communities) in which everyone in town knows everything about everyone there. These people have grown up together, as did their parents, and their children are friends. Grudges and hard feelings exist, but they are kept hidden for the sake of getting along. Preachers are filled with enough righteous indignation that their congregations are willing to take their marching orders from the men even when their sympathies are elsewhere. No one is willing to rock the boat in little Brownsburg, Virginia – until Charlie Beale comes along.Then, all bets are off.Rated at: 5.0
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I first discovered Robert Goolrick when I read A Reliable Wife. I was captivated by his writing style and his storytelling. I was eager to read his latest novel - Heading Out to Wonderful. Charlie Beale rolls into the small town of Brownsburg, Virginia in 1948. Brownsburg is off the beaten path and nothing much happens - life goes on in day to day set rhythms. But the arrival of this stranger and his two suitcases brings change. Charlie has one suitcase full of money and the other full of his butcher's knives. After days spent silently wandering the town, he decides that this sleepy town will become the home he is looking for. He secures a job with the local butcher Charlie, allows Charlie's wife Alma to fuss over him and becomes friends with their five year old son Sam. And with the money, he begins to buy land and a house. Heading Out to Wonderful is Sam's narrative - told many years later. "This story actually happened, and it happened pretty much the way I'm going to tell it to you. It's a true story, as much as six decades of remembering and telling can allow it to be true. But I still ask myself sometimes late at night, about what happened, how it all turned out, about the life I've led, you know, everything. I ask myself the same questions they ask me, these people who've only heard about it, who weren't even around when it all took place. What happened and why did it have to happen in the way it did?" What happened? Charlie Beale saw Sylvan Glass - the young wife of the town's richest man. And that, my friends was the beginning..... I love Goolrick's writing style. It is full of opposites, of push and pull. The story is stark, but the language is rich and full. The tale is full of tension, but the journey there is told in a leisurely fashion with eloquent prose that had me stopping, rereading, enjoying and only then moving on to the next page. Charlie and Sylvan are magnets inextricably attracted and young Sam is witness to all. Goolrick takes his novel places I didn't see coming - the final chapters caught me unawares. Heading Out to Wonderful again explores love, attraction, friendship, betrayal and inevitability. Sam's accounting of things takes on an almost otherworldly, mystic feel, as though we've been allowed to see behind the curtain. As Charlie says..... "Let me tell you something son. When you're young, and you head out to wonderful, everything is fresh and bright as a brand new penny, but before you get to wonderful, you're going to have to pass through all right. And when you get to all right, stop and take a good, long look, because that may be as far as you're ever going to go." Pick up a copy of Goolrick's book - you'll pass straight by all right and directly on in to wonderful.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Heading Out to Wonderful is a captivating story of Charlie Beale who has just returned from the war and is traveling around Viringia looking for a new place to call home. He has two suitcases with him, one filled with cash, the other with his butcher knives. He finds Brownsburg a city in the valley of Virgina to be to his liking . He take a job as a butcher. He becomes close to the owner Will along with his wife Alma and their son Sam.He thinks he has all he needs until he meets Sylvan Glass, a 17 year old girl married to the richest, meanest man in town Boatyard Glass. Charlie becomes obsessed with her and they begin a torrid affair that leads them both into the path of trouble.The story takes on some major issues of the time along with moral and ethical ones too. How depraved is it to incorporate a 5 year old boy in an adult situation? To what ends will someone go for love and is love ever enough. Not quite the caliber of A Reliable Wife but definitely a good read. Goolrick delivers a powerful story about love, acceptance and understanding.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    "I still ask myself sometimes late at night, about what happened, how it all turned out, about the life I've led, you know. Everything. I ask myself the same questions they ask me, these people who've only heard about it, who weren't even around when it all took place. What happened and why did it have to happen in the way it did?"Long before we identify the narrator, as readers we find ourselves asking those same questions, even though we know it is 'just' a story, set in Brownsburg, Virginia in 1948. This small town feels familiar--you can imagine driving through it and stopping for soda on a long car trip. Goolrick describes it precisely, from the simple customs of returning home each day for lunch to the evenings where families sat on porches listening to the single radio station playing. In some places, it felt reminiscent of Scout and Boo's neighborhood in To Kill a Mockingbird, or as a less-jaded version of The Sound and the Fury. The almost numbing perfection of homes and streets creates a sort of unexpected tension...it's not readily apparent where or when the inevitable conflict will appear in the story.In any case, the town setting is almost a game board of potential friction, and when Goolrick adds his complicated characters to the mix, he enriches the story in varying layers. There are seven greatly significant characters (I'm avoiding spoilers here, so I'm going to be as cryptic as possible) that each could carry the novel on their own, as they are so unique and unexpected. Each could be a subject for study in the subtext of the overall story.Charlie Beale is a newcomer to the town, quickly buying up land while working in a butcher shop. He becomes very close to a married couple with a precocious little boy, Sam. Sam finds a nearly mythic figure in Charlie Beale, and idolizes him immediately. Charlie settles into this new town with every advantage and a mysterious box of money. What could go wrong?Things do go wrong, but not in the ways I was predicting. I thought I knew where the story was headed and my assumptions led me astray, but I think Goolrick intended to mess a bit with what we may be expecting in this sort of story. In creating the fictional city, Goolrick worked in all-too-real issues that his characters were facing (the budding resistance to traditional gender roles and race relations) so that each of their stories felt authentic and fully developed. Beyond these issues, the novel itself, a simple story made up of complicated people, pushes us to consider the drama on our own terms. Exactly at what point do you cut off a friendship that appears doomed? If everyone is lying, how do you find the strength to tell the truth? How do you decide when to step away from a problem and turn your back? Are you complicit if you don't?I would have liked it a bit more if the complicated characters had interacted more, it would have given it more depth.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This is a story about a good man, Charlie Beale, who pays dearly for the mistakes he makes. The setting is a small town in Virginia in 1948. Although Jackie Robinson has broken the color barrier in major league baseball, Brownsburg, VA is a god fearing community where prejudice is rampant. Charlie arrives a stranger in Brownsburg after the war with nothing but a set of knives (he's an expert butcher) and a pile of money. He falls for Sylvan Glass, the young, beautiful wife of the wealthiest man in town. Charlie goes to work for the butcher in town and takes on the owner's five year old son, Sam, as though he is his own. Sam witnesses the adulterous affair that destroys both Charlie and Sylvan. The book is well written, suspenseful and can easily be read in a few sittings.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    A very Southern book. Dark, light, joy, sadness. Memories kept alive so that people we have loved remain with us. Beautifully written but horribly sad. I keep thinking that if it hadn't been for the preachers and their damning words the book might have ended differently, if this had been real life. Life and love, action and consequences.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    Charlie Beale, a loner, recently home from the war in Europe--wanders into the town of Brownsburg, a sleepy village of only a few hundred people nestled in the Valley of Virginia. He brings with him two suitcases: one contains all his worldly possessions, including a set of butcher's knives; the other is full of money. Charlie quickly finds a job at the local butcher shop and through his work there meets all the townspeople, most notably Sam Haislett, the five-year-old son of the shop's owner; and Sylvan Glass, the beautiful, eccentric teenage bride of the town's richest man. What no one anticipates is how the interaction of these three people will alter the town forever, and how the passion that flares between Charlie and Sylvan will mark young Sam for life. Summary BPLBallad of a sordid affair--who sits their kind boss' trusting 5 year old boy--a boy you profess to love and care for like a son--in a kitchen with crayons and a colouring book while you go upstairs to have sex with someone else's wife?? And asks the 5 year old to lie for him??Beautiful writing, but I couldn't get past what, to me, amounts to child abuse.6 out of 10. For fans of Robert Goolrick
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    Will be adding the "to wonderful" quote to my collection of quotes to remember, refer to.
    Having trouble rating this book higher, because I had difficulty with things that were never explained, things that didn't fit for me - even in the stretch of "it's fiction".
    However, if I muse on the individual characters and some of the interactions, it is excellent, evocative, and magical in some ways.
    For me, personally, just wish those wonderful characters and locale descriptives could have been fit into a slightly differently slanted story line.
    Later:
    Was going to revise my rating, when discussing with Winston and he asked if this wasn't the standard format for a "tragedy" or like an opera . . .oh, my but they have a zillion twists, turns, traumas, tragedies . . .
    But - - - they come with MUSIC!!!!! and some of it quite good/moving/sometimes 'catchy' even !
    So, on further thought of my further thoughts, going to leave this one at the "it was OK" rating. Wouldn't discourage reading it because segments are very well done. Just don't expect it to make any profound conclusion. Too bad that the great characters that could have been there are about 3 books or 1000 pages short.
    I'm done now.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    The book opens with a first person narrated introduction to the quiet town of Brownsburg, Va. in 1948. The story begins when Charlie Beale arrives with a suitcase full of cash and a set of butcher knives "sharp as razors", adding one more to the population of 538 people. The story is about a particular town, in a particular time, and a particular place to a particular group of people who belonged to the land. Charlie Beale is not one of those particular people. He is a perpetual outsider, not just because of the nature of Brownsburg, but by his own nature as well. Through out the story we are given clues to his separate nature. One example is his difficulty fitting in at church leading to his identification with the people of the AME church, who didn't particularly want a white man man to join them. Through out the story, Charlie remains a cipher. It is not clear where the suitcase full of cash came from. There is an allusion to an unhappy childhood. The knives are German. And it's not clear where this 40 year old man spent the years of WWII.Another theme in the story are the various types of love. There is love for a child as Charlie takes on his boss's 5 year old son, Sam Haislett. There is neighborly love as the Haisletts hire Charlie in the butcher shop and Alma takes him under her wing. There is filial love, as Charlie's brother Ned comes to help Charlie in his time of need. And there is the forbidden love that Charlie has for Sylvan Glass, the wife of Boaty Glass, the richest and possibly meanest man in town. And there is self love, which is the undoing of all of the others.This exploration of love and motivation are similar to Goolrick's previous book, The Reliable Wife. Both are sinister and somewhat cynical. While The Reliable Wife takes place in wintry Wisconsin and St. Louis, this book is firmly rooted in summer in the Appalachian Mountains with a Southern Gothic atmosphere in the writing.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    It took a few chapters for the story to really get moving but once it did I found it difficult to put down! I really liked Charlie even though he did some things I wasn't happy about. The ending threw me for a loop, I didn't expect it to end that way! The author wrote that it was based on a true story which made it even more interesting!
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    A mysterious stranger settles in a rural West Virginia town and soon falls in love with another man's wife. Tale told, with some gaping holes, by a 12-year-old boy. The title was better than the story.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Think of how hard it is to reconstruct memories with only the written word: to convey mood and atmosphere; to paint, using only sentences strung together, the color and emotion and sheer force of human passions; to make a landscape come so alive that we can feel the frisson of cold water in a lake or the cruel avoidance of neighbors’ acknowledgments in the street; to enable us to feel lust and taste blood and understand what it is to do the unthinkable. This is precisely what Goolrick can do, like almost no one else.This is a story with so many layers, that each time you think you know what it is about, another motif occurs to you. In that way – in its paradoxical combination of complexity and precision - it seems acutely real, making it both haunting and unforgettable.Charlie Beale, age 39, comes to Brownsburg, Virginia in 1948 and decides he wants to settle there. He has searched around a lot; he is homesick for a place he has never been. Brownsburg is an insular community but Charlie loves the land and feels right there. He is a butcher by trade, and manages to convince the town’s one butcher, Will Haislett, that he would make a good assistant. Will’s whole family takes him in – his wife Alma helps Charlie get settled, and their five-year old son Sam, who inexplicably refers to Charlie as “Beebo” gets attached to Charlie like a second father. And Sam becomes for Charlie his fantasy son.Charlie is working on his moral compass: he is striving for goodness, and he is looking for “something wonderful” in his life. Alma tells him people find the thing they expect to find, but it doesn’t work that way for Charlie. Alma insists he to go to church to be accepted in the town, but the white preachers are fixated on shame and sin and hell. He is informed it is unacceptable to go to the small black church, even though he finds solace there in the joyfulness of the service. Thus, he cannot find a path to happiness in the white churches. He is prevented from finding it in the black church. And finally he gets undone by the only option he finds open to him: the worship of Sylvan Glass, the beautiful young wife of the local richest man in town. Sylvan was literally purchased as a bride by the much-older and mean-spirited Harrison “Boaty” Glass, who “had wanted a glorious hood ornament for the car of his life.” Sylvan, from a hardscrabble family, had Hollywood dreams that transported her loveliness to what she thought was its rightful place. Whether she lived with Boaty or not didn’t interfere with her imagination. When she and Charlie saw each other, however, there was an instant attraction. Charlie looked like a movie star to her, and to him, Sylvan looked like an angel; in her he saw the answer to his search for redemption. But when Charlie went from the realm of fantasy to reality for Sylvan, the flesh and blood of his need was too unlike the celluloid visions that so mesmerized her. So she made a choice. … a choice that changed everything and everyone who paid the price for her immersion in illusions.Discussion: It is interesting to me that this author arouses such vehement reactions. Whether it is with profound admiration or intense dislike, readers respond to his exposure of raw emotions and secret passions, and to his expression of the perhaps unwelcome message that desire and sex and love and want and need are not always romantic and pretty, but sometimes just another form of violence. In this book, he ups the stakes yet again, and adds religion to the forces of evil that can bring men down, turning Christian salvation into a death sentence.There is a certain distance with which the author keeps us from the characters, and I think that is necessary. Even with the walls he erects, the pain we see acted out is so red and tender that any closer could hardly be borne. As it is, he abrades the cocoon of our consciousness that protects us from the depth and breadth of the things that scare us. But they are the very same things that make us the most human. We are not gods; we are human beings, and there are few writers living today who can show that vulnerability like this author. Certainly, there are moments of “wonderful,” but through Goolrick we also gain an intimate familiarity with darkness; too intimate for some, but brilliantly done, nevertheless.Evaluation: The author has said that this book is based on a story a friend told him thirty years ago; that it is, in its essential elements, a true story. But what Goolrick does is take this anecdote of a true event and turn it into universal truths about the human condition. It is a spellbinding story, and a spellbinding book.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    As I started reading this novel I kept picturing the black and white movies I used to watch with my grandfather, the ones starring Bette Davis or June Allyson because that is the feeling and the tone that this novel sets. It opens with a chapter narrated by an man in his sixties, telling the story of what happened in this town when he was a young boy of 5 and 6. So we know from the beginning that this is not going to be a happy little novel. I was not a big fan of Goolrick's last novel but I absolutely loved this one. The prose and the descriptions are wonderfully elegant, the townspeople for the most part likable and at the same times complex. . The time period of the forties and the wholesome goodness and innocence of that time are all wonderfully related. Charlie himself, could have been any drifter albeit one with quite a bit of money, looking for a town to call his own. The tragedy, from this man's telling was such a downfall, and totally shocking to this reader, such a shame. Really did not see it coming. So many things are touched on here, black and white relations, religion, moral standards and yes an all consuming love. To be honest I will probably go back and read it again just to see what I missed and try to figure out exactly why it happened. Thought provoking novel of a time gone by and one that will engender many discussions. ARC from publisher.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    When Charlie Beale arrives in Brownsville, Virginia in the summer of 1948, his background is a mystery. All that we (and the townspeople) know is that Charlie is trained as a butcher. He goes to work for Will Haislett at the town's only butcher shop and gradually is accepted by the townspeople and by Will's family, especially his 5-year-old son Sam. But a series of events, some caused by Charlie and some outside of his control, set Charlie and the whole town on a path that will upset the delicate balance of their lives. This story kept me turning the pages of this book, but I felt that more could have been done to develop the characters and make their motivations clearer. I was especially disappointed by the ending, which didn't seem to fit with the characters actions up to that point.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    A small, placid Virginia town in 1948 is the setting for this tale of torching passion. Charlie Beale arrives in town looking for a place to call home. Having wandered for years after the war, something calls to him in Brownsburg that leads him to settle down - first in a field by the river, and later getting a job in the butcher shop and buying his own home. He becomes a second father to the butcher's son Sam, who adores him and follows him everywhere. Charlie is on his way to building a life of approbation and belonging, with the reader following along in appreciation, until he sees Her.She is Sylvan, the beautiful wife of the town's richest and least liked man, Boatie Glass. She is a damaged soul from Blue Ridge poverty, with dreams of glamour and longing for ... something, she isn't sure what.The combination is explosive, and Goodrick leads the reader through it, both through the eyes of Charlie and of Sam. I found the viewpoint of Sam is especially wrenching, in the midst of secrets and drama he cannot understand. Goodrick does a masterful job of telling the story with sympathy for all.Recommended.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Let me tell you something, son. 
When you're young, and you head out to wonderful, everything is fresh and bright as a brand-new penny, 
but before you get to wonderful you're going to have to pass through all right. And when you get to all right, stop and take a good, long look, because that may be as far as you're ever going to go." Thus the story of Charlie Beale begins...a tragic love story in a sleepy small town in Virginia. The character development of Charlie is so define that you fear that the worst will happen when he enters into a love affair with a fantasy woman. Sylvan Glass is a living breathing fantasy made from her image of how a Hollywood starlet is created. As the story progresses you feel for Charlie, Sylvan and Sam, the young boy who is witness to the small town tragedy. Mr. Goolrick's narrative creates a spell that does not stop until the end of the book. My only disappointment was the reader is left with the mystery of where did Charlie's money come from.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This is a novel from the not long gone, but still days past, and also from the days partly imagined, fashioned with a Holywood movie filter in place. The times past when lives were more singular and the decisions made more grave. One gave in to destiny as if it were true, as if it existed. In a place where love is larger than life itself, and the reason too, and characters cut out sharply in the scorching light of a merciless summer, the mistakes are made but never regretted. One cannot help oneself, one accepts whatever comes next. Lives are broken and ruined without hesitation, without even a thought, as if hit by a natural disaster.I loved the way Goolrick eased us readers into the story like every good storyteller should, by showing us the larger picture of the small town and the country, by setting up the stage for the dramatic love story. It was so good I could almost hear a manly Hollywood movie voice introducing the plot, whispering in my ear, promising terrible, large things, cajoling me into this tragedy.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    In spite of the title and the lyrical writing, readers can tell pretty quickly that ultimately something awful is going to happen. A stranger arrives in a small Virginia town soon after the end of World War II, and becomes a local favorite for many reasons. He falls in love with the young woman bought by the wealthiest man in town as his bride, and we just know that no good can come of it. There is small town goodness, race relations, religion, and pettiness all converging on the seemingly inevitable ending.