wild and outrageous story!

The Great Glorious Goddamn of It All by Josh Ritter
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Having read and loved "Bright's Passage" by Josh Ritter, which is serious and excellent historical fiction, "The Great Glorious Goddamn of It All" took me off guard. But once i was in, it was a wild and crazy, emotional and moving, ride from start to finish. It is about lumbering (ie. lumberjacks and very large trees in the Northwest region of the US) in the early 1900's. The tale is narrated by ninety-something year old Weldon Applegate recollecting his memories of when he was a 13 year old boy, coming of age in the company of lumberjacks. The story frequently switches the time line, back and forth between 13 y.o. Weldon, an older Weldon, and "present day" ninety-something Weldon. Bringing in the viewpoints of a 13 y.o. boy makes the story larger than life, with some events and characters taking on supernatural status. Even after finishing the story, i'm left wondering what literally happened, and what happened in the mind of the teen Weldon. The wild and outrageous story line reminds me of some of the more famous Vonnegut stories ("Slaughterhouse Five" and "Cat's Cradle"), as well as Heller's "Catch-22". This is a great read that i'm probably going to re-read just so i pick up what i may have missed in the first go around. Another great, albeit different book from Josh Ritter!!

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