An Evening of Ordinary Grace at Tom's

Dinner and Acknowledgments

Krueger's novel about a mid-century Minnesota town featured exactly three meals: Gus' improvised spam and eggs, the boys' recurring bologna and PB&J sandwiches, and Mrs. Drum's tasteless tuna casserole.  It also featured one dessert:  ice cream.  To our relief, last Monday Tom chose the latter for our dessert and ignored the former in favor of a classic American menu:  grilled cheeseburgers, homemade potato salad and baked beans, and a mixed green salad.  All of it was terrific. Well done, Tom!

Our meal was also *graced* by the presence of two MBC alums, Garth and Peter.  Both men have been busy and both have been missed.  We were genuinely grateful to have them with us for the evening.  

Our Review and Discussion of Ordinary Grace by William Kent Krueger

Set in the summer of 1961, Ordinary Grace is the story of the Drum family's tragic loss, as seen through the eyes of its 13-year old narrator, Frank Drum.  Priming the reader for the tragedy ahead, the novel opens with two unexpected deaths: a child is killed while playing on the train tracks, and an itinerant is found dead by the river.  As the town grapples with--and gossips about--these two events, Frank introduces us to the members of his family: his Methodist minister father; his beautiful but brittle mother; his stuttering younger brother; and his musical prodigy sister, who is headed to Juilliard in the fall.  When death is visited upon one of them, it's the unexpected grace of ordinary moments that helps the rest carry on.

Our reaction to the book was predictably positive.  Yes, the plot was a little derivative according to Doug (thanks for the email!), with echoes of other family saga / coming-of-age tales.  Larry called it "Richard Russo light" (Russo's Nobody's Fool still sits atop our rankings) and, with Glenn and Doug, likened it to To Kill a Mockingbird's expose of tragedy and animus in small town America.  However,  our naysayers found much to enjoy, even if the ending was telegraphed (Glenn) and at least one character's personal revelation was trite (thanks for calling in, George!).

So, why did we like it so much?  Well, who doesn't like a heroic boy who throws the town bully into a reservoir, ignores his dad's well-intentioned commands, and singlehandedly solves the mystery at the end of the novel?  OK, I'm over-simplifying, but Jack was so taken by the narrator's precociousness that he gave the book his first-ever 10.  And Dean, who grew up as the younger brother in his family, was charmed by Frank Drum's fearlessness.  Ultimately, however, what captivated all of us were the simple moments in the story that uplifted both character and reader simultaneously. Gus making dinner for the boys, the "bad cop" letting Gus out of jail, the "bad Indian" showing gratitude, the wife-beater returning to church, Jake's cathartic rendition of grace, and so on.  All of these were the novel's extra-ordinary moments.

Our Rating of Ordinary Grace

The blurb on the back of Krueger's affecting novel about mid-century America proclaims that Ordinary Grace won the Midwest Booksellers Choice Award.  If we categorized our fiction geographically, I have no doubt that Krueger would lead our midwest rankings.  But with only our 1-10 numerical ranking available to show our appreciation, we gladly gave Krueger a fulsome 8.0.

Next Up:  Marching Powder by Thomas McFadden

Jack gave us a list that included Revolutionary Road, Remains of the Day, Ohio, and Wenner's memoir, Like a Rolling Stone.  We turned them all down in favor of Marching Powder, the true story of a British man's incarceration in a Colombian prison for drug smuggling.  We'll see next month how closely McFadden's story parallels Stan's youthful escapades in South America.