This Tender Land - August CC Book Club Discussion

[Caraid]

@Mary13

I liked this book very much — it was a quick read and quite a yarn. The narrator’s disclaimer at the end nicely anticipates and quashes any attempt on the part of a skeptical reader (like me) to pick apart the story.

I am back from vacation. I read @Mary13 's first discussion post and smiled. I liked the book while I was reading it, but really loved the epilogue! It was my favorite part of the book!

Okay, back to reading all the responses.

[Caraid]

I actually like the book more now than I did while reading it. This discussion is great and I love all your insights and links. When I was reading the book, I was trying to make the story real, but it’s more like a tale told around the campfire. The more I look at it that way, the more I appreciate it. I also listened to the audio book. It was well done and, in hindsight, sounded very much like an older man telling his childhood story, complete with embellishments.

[jollymama]

Aunt Julia becoming a fashion designer was right over the top. For me the fakiest part of the whole book! Actually everything about Aunt Julia seemed overly contrived!

(But here I am, wanting my fiction to be “real.”)

[HImom]

Those photos look pretty bleak, like the times.

[Mary13]

I just realized that the epigraph of This Tender Land is:

“Sing in me, Muse, and through me tell the story.” - Homer, The Odyssey

I must have turned right past that page — straight from “For Boopsie, with love” to the Prologue. And to think that I was only associating the name “Odie” with Garfield’s overly friendly dog
companion.

The Publisher’s Weekly review of This Tender Land called it "an enjoyable riff on The Odyssey,” which sent me back to thinking about comparisons (with a little help from my friend Cliff’s Notes).

As @ignatius mentioned above, one re-imagined character from The Odyssey is Jack as the Cyclops, "the one-eyed cannibal giant who traps Odysseus and a scouting party in his cave.”

I would add that Sister Eve = Athena, Goddess of Wisdom, who "frequently intervenes on Odysseus’ or Telemachus’ behalf, often in disguise.”

If pushed, I could see Mose and Albert as Eumaeus and Philoetius, "Odysseus’ loyal swineherd and cowherd, they assist him in his return to Ithaca.”

And finally, Aunt Julia = Anticleia, Odysseus’ mother, who “dies grieving her son’s long absence and sees him only during his visit to the Land of the Dead.” With Aunt Julia, it would be a spiritual death — with the brothel and its downtrodden inhabitants as the Land of the Dead.

[jerseysouthmomchess]

@mary13 thanks for the comparison to the Odyssey!

[silverlady]

I am late to the discussion as my grandchildren have been visiting, and I didn’t have the focus to respond.

@Mary13 thank you for choosing this book. I really enjoyed it. I did catch the references to the Odyssey. (I think that I will reread The Odyssey sometime in the future.)

In the Epilogue Brinkman asks Sister Eve and Emmy for forgiveness and Odie, Albert and Mose’s forgiveness.

“Of all that we’re asked to give others in this life, the most difficult to offer may be forgiveness.” Could you have forgiven Brinkman? I don’t know that I could have, but I am glad that they did.

I did love the book and look forward to sharing it with my daughters.

[Mary13]

@silverlady

“Of all that we’re asked to give others in this life, the most difficult to offer may be forgiveness.” Could you have forgiven Brinkman? I don’t know that I could have, but I am glad that they did.

Mr. Brinkman seemed more weak than evil, so I think I could see my way to forgive him – although it would be hard because standing by and letting evil happen is almost as bad.

At least he didn’t seem quite as soul-less as his wife – and the nice music teacher Miss Stratton clearly found something appealing in him!

[ignatius]

@silverlady

I am late to the discussion as my grandchildren have been visiting, and I didn’t have the focus to respond.

@Mary13 thank you for choosing this book. I really enjoyed it. I did catch the references to the Odyssey. (I think that I will reread The Odyssey sometime in the future.)

Me too. I’m interested in reading The Odyssey - Translated by Emily Wilson - the first woman to do so. The translation got a lot of positive buzz when published in 2017. I thought about reading it then and this book has brought those thoughts up once again.

[Mary13]

Photos that inspired the book (including the granite marker): This Tender Land — William Kent Krueger

Here is the full story on that horrible execution, with the names of the 38:

https://indiancountrytoday.com/news/traumatic-true-history-full-list-dakota-38

[mathmom]

I’ll never get over seeing those pictures of the Dust Bowl where you see it really was a dust bowl, not a metaphor, not an exaggeration.

[jerseysouthmomchess]

The mistreatment of native americas is a tragedy, and it saddens me to read Lincoln’s role in approving the slaughter.

[Mary13]

5. After having escaped Jack, the vagabonds encounter a Native American man named Forrest. He appears friendly and shares a meal with them, but he’s also aware that there is a $500 reward for their capture — a huge amount of money at the time. The children are unsure whether to trust him or not. What would you do in their situation?

Of course, the children were right to not trust Forrest when he first appeared at their campsite. His behavior raised a red flag – which in the end turned out to be a red herring as he went from presumed enemy to friend. We don’t even know exactly how that came about as it happened while Odie was away.

Forrest didn’t have a strong role in the story–at least not in terms of moving the plot along. He seemed to be there as a mentor to Mose, and his presence allowed Mose to leave the group for a long period of time, with the Vagabonds (and the reader) still assured of his safety.

Despite all the harrowing adventures endured by the children, I think one of the underlying messages in the novel is that most people are basically good. The people they encountered were often helpful and generous (even the bit part of the lady in the shoe store). And even those who were initially menancing (Forrest, Brickman, Sid, Jack) were either not bad at all or capable of redemption.

(Although I’ve convinced myself that Jack was actually the escapee from the institution for the criminally insane. )

[Colorado_mom]

LOL - Forrest did have the role of making me cringe over his next possible steps/deceit.

[CBBBlinker]

Finished the book a couple of days ago, but it was a busy weekend, so no time to post. I just skimmed through earlier posts.

I enjoyed the book, in spite of the numerous moments of skepticism on my part. There were so many highly unlikely events, and Odie was, in many ways, wise and philosophical well beyond his years.

For other Book Clubs I have recently read “The Four Winds” by Kristin Hannah about the Dust Bowl/Depression and “Even as We Breathe” by Annette Saunooke Clapsaddle about a Cherokee Indian in NC in 1942 and how he was treated. Clearly there are overlapping themes!

[HImom]

There are kids who are wise and philosophical beyond their years—both of my kids are “old souls,” in that respect and mentioned as such by their preschool. That was one aspect of the book that rang fairly “true to life” for me.

[jerseysouthmomchess]

Forrest baffled me. I was certain he was lured by the reward monies, and intended to turn Vagabonds in.
As I recall Forrest appeared at the same time Hooverville clan embraced Odie, and were good guys, until they weren’t. It was
a confusing moment on the yellow brick road- odyssey friends or enemies, and the story has too many of these, could have edited a few out,

Regarding one eyed Jack, was he a wife abuser? I don’t remember any redeeming qualites.

[Mary13]

@jerseysouthmomchess

Regarding one eyed Jack, was he a wife abuser? I don’t remember any redeeming qualites.

Nothing about Jack is fully explained. The neighbor tells Odie that Jack’s wife Aggie and daughter Sophie disappeared in the middle of the night, and when Odie sneaks into Jack’s house, he finds a room that looks like it was the scene of a violent altercation: “The longer I stood there looking, the greater the belief I had that something terrible had occurred here, something frightening.” At one point, Odie sees Jack weeping under an Oak tree.

Later, Odie runs into Jack, who appears to be a changed man. But Aggie and Sophie aren’t with him, and the mysterious Rudy is reported to be off in Fargo.

[HImom]

Yes, a lot of the folks in the book weren’t really explained or fleshed out as to their backstories or what was motivating them.

One eyed Jack did give them shelter from the rain, didn’t turn them in, and fed them (or gave Emma provisions to prepare for everyone). He was mysterious and seemed brooding and potentially volatile.

Forrest seemed to exist to help re/awaken the native in Moses. He also fed the hungry travelers and taught noodling for catch fish.

The brothel seemed the most “off,” especially Odie’s descriptions of repeatedly peeing from his room to down below. I didn’t see how that really added to the story.

[Mary13]

@HImom

The brothel seemed the most “off,” especially Odie’s descriptions of repeatedly peeing from his room to down below. I didn’t see how that really added to the story.

Maybe the brothel was the closest thing Krueger could think of to a “Land of the Dead” setting, ala The Odyssey. Still, a stretch.

The other incident that had a high “ew factor” for me was when the man brought his dead wife to the revival. But I suppose it showed that Sister Eve was cool-headed and compassionate even in extreme circumstances.