Poor, Unfortunate Souls

Somehow it’s harder to write a review of a book I love. It’s difficult to explain why, exactly, The Last Days of Dogtown by Anita Diamant thrills me so. And difficult to say, “Everyone should read this book,” when I don’t believe everyone – or even most people – would love it as much as I do.

So I recommend this book for a certain person, someone who …

1.Loves the history of everyday life. Not the battles or the politics but the ways people cooked and slept and washed and loved. The professional critics say Diamant transplants characters with modern sensibilities into a faux-historic setting. Maybe that’s so, but at least it makes you feel you’re experiencing what it must’ve been to live in the early 1800s.

2.Enjoys a character-driven story. Dogtown is light on plot and tends to be episodic. But it travels into the minds of a whole cast of characters, each one of whom is interesting enough to warrant the journey. There’s even a brief chapter exquisitely told from the point of view of the dog Greyling, who lives on the outskirts of the dog pack and sleeps at the feet of Judy Rhines, the story’s chief heroine.

Dogtown is a story of the poor and unfortunate inhabitants of a fading settlement in the hills outside Gloucester, Mass. It is a miserable place in almost all respects, and like it, the book offers few bright spots. Yet somehow Diamant keeps it from being a miserable book. Her language is clean and straightforward – mostly devoid of sentiment. It is like the attitudes of her characters – hardy and not deluded about their own meager prospects. Each character is a jewel, even the drunk/pimp John Stanwood, who thinks he sees an angel in a tree and tries to reform.

Then there’s the narrator, Kate Nelligan. She is a wonder. A revelation. So good I want to rush out and listen to all the books she’s narrated and rent all her movies, even the ones on Lifetime.

Okay, I change my mind. I DO recommend this book to everyone. Especially the people who love the history of the everyday and character-driven novels, but also everyone who likes a good yarn. Everyone who lives in a small, gossipy town (or even a big one). Everyone who has been down and out. Everyone who has never been poor and trapped but wants to know what it’s like. Just everyone.

And maybe, as the delightful Kate Nelligan reads the last words of the book, you will shed a tear or two. Not because the words are sad but because Dogtown, the book and the town you love, have come to an end.