Where the Crawdads Sing

This isn't the type of book I would normally read. My book club selected it. I almost abandoned it at several points early on. It finally engaged me slightly about a third of the way in. It's very well written. I admired that the entire time I was reading it. But it was SLOW!

The book tells the story of Kya, the "Marsh Girl". Her family lives in a shack in a North Carolina marsh. At age 6, her mother and most of her family abandon her. By age 7, her father abandons her too. The book follows her as she fends for herself and grows to adulthood. There are some relationships along the way, if you like that sort of thing. There's even an incident that may or may not be a crime. The latter part of the book revolves around that.

Overall, I don't regret reading it. I would have much preferred spending that time with a different book.

This drama centers on the mid-20th century small-town southern coastal prejudices against the white trash marsh people. Owens does an excellent job with the setting, employing prose that teems with description, immersing the reader in the ambient. The main character, Kya, is complicated and has secrets that are not revealed until the last page, and I'm not going to spoil any of it. Many reviewers criticize the disparity between the dialogue and the narrative voice. While I agree, I feel this strategy contributes to the unreliable nature of the storytelling.

This is a moving story that I wish I liked more, but part of my enjoyment comes from the ability to maintain suspension of disbelief, and that is the rub: I had a real problem accepting some of the behaviors (mostly how the town reacts to the little girl who is abandoned, how she is scorned, how they continue to scorn her after her notable success...) It just felt too contrived. On the other hand, the kicker at the end makes all of this mostly forgivable. By then, though, every character annoyed me, so I was left with mixed feelings from actually crying when Kya confesses "I don't even know how to be consoled" to rolling these same eyes when she expresses her distrust of love. It feels... contrived, and maybe that's to be expected.