A Different Sort of Fever

 

My husband has had the flu for the last couple of days, and don't tell him, but that's kind of fortunate. Because I have been totally engrossed with Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver. I read - no, devoured - it in less than 48 hours.

What a read. I'd heard of the book, vaguely, and my main impression was from a Reddit post that said something to the effect of, "It was so dark, I cried on every page." So, the world being what it is right now, I wasn't especially eager for a downer of a book. But while sitting in the parking lot waiting for my husband to see the doctor (I didn't want to risk sitting in a waiting room full of sick people), I checked on the Libby app for my next read after The Last of the Mohicans. Maybe Kingsolver's The Bean Trees, I thought. But in the list on Libby, every Kingsolver book had a hold - except this one. I thought, 'What the heck? If it's too much of a downer, I can always drop it and move on to something else.' So I checked it out and started reading in the parking lot. I was hooked from the first line, and in fact, kept my poor husband waiting for nearly 30 minutes before it registered that the message he had sent meant he was done with his appointment, not just his flu test.

No doubt about it, this book deals with dark issues - drug addiction, incompetent foster care, loss and death. But it's not a downer, really. Demon is a character you root for, and even in his worst moments, he doesn't let you down. He makes some terrible choices, but you can see the logic of them, even while your brain is saying, no! Don't do that! Ugh....you did it. Despite his background and the impediments that drag him down, he keeps striving, and you believe up to the end (and beyond) that he's going to make it out of the obstacles and traps that life has laid in his path.

But this is not just Demon's story, and maybe that's where the downer part comes in. Kingsolver addresses head-on things like the tragic impact of opioid over-prescription on the lives of individuals and communities, the lack of funds and oversight and just basic attention to the welfare of children in the foster care system, the current of racism, and let's face it, just bad parenting. This book is also a love letter to Appalachia and a condemnation of the forces that have stereotyped the people and communities of that region. I don't live in Appalachia, but some of the same things could be said about the Ozarks. After all, many of the people who settled here came from the mountains of Tennessee, etc. As I read the book, I could see many elements in the story here around me - the worship of the high school football team, a job at Walmart as maybe the best economic opportunity in a town, children being raised by grandparents. And there are also always the stereotypes that we are ignorant and backward. I remember when my husband and I went to graduate school in Kansas, one of the first things one of his fellow students said when learning we were from Arkansas was, "How do you compliment a girl from Arkansas? Nice tooth." Meant entirely in fun, of course.

Anyway, I'm really glad Libby forced me into reading this book!