I had the good fortune to have a day off this Tuesday. A member of our reading group selected Ordinary Grace by William Ken Krueger for this month. The book qualifies as a real page turner. A day or two ago, I had put it down on page 63 and at 9:00 this morning, I picked it up, sat down near my favorite window to read, and at each new chapter watched the rain for a minute or two. I planned to stop at noon when the weather would clear according to the reports.
However, I read until I finished the book. If you are looking for a mystery, this story will not disappoint you. It took me until page 264 before I had an idea of “who dun it” and at the end, 43 pages later, my guess was correct.
Frank Drum at forty years old tells the events of the fateful summer in 1961, when he was a teenager in a small Minnesota town. The description on Amazon includes the following: “he finds himself thrust into an adult world full of secrets, lies, adultery, and betrayal, suddenly called upon to demonstrate a maturity and gumption beyond his years.” http://www.amazon.com/Ordinary-Grace-William-Kent-Krueger-ebook/dp/B008J2G5Y6/
Here are a few quotes from the book:
On Page 66, Frank overhears his father talking with his friend, Emil, as they play chess. Emil says, “But greatness? Who can say? That’s something, it seems to me, that depends more on God and circumstance than on our own efforts.”
Page 61, Emil, who teaches Frank’s sister to prepare for Julliard, which everyone thinks will make her happy, says, “”No one can be happy all the time. Better, I think, to wish for her wisdom, a vertue not so fickle.”
Page 69 Frank describes the land around Emil’s house where his sister creates out-standing flower and vegetable gardens. “The world inside that picket fence seemed like a good place, a place in which all the damaged pieces somehow fit.”
P. 175, Frank says, “Loss, once it’s become a certainty, is like a rock you hold in your hand. It has weight and dimension and texture. It’s solid and can be assessed and dealt with.
If you have read Ordinary Grace, what number would you give it with 10 being the most liked?
Julaina Kleist-Corwin
Editor of Written Across the Genres
