Review: "Mohawk" by Richard Russo

Sometimes, a book cannot be the author’s best work, but there is simply something about it that you like. It could be certain setting, which usually isn’t the case for me, or a character you fall in love with, which happens to me a lot in certain books. Those are all obvious reason for liking a book that is imperfect, but one that occurred to me as I closed the pages of Mohawk, the first novel by great American author Richard Russo, was the charm that a book has. This book, while clearly lacking the scope and emotional depth of later works, most notably Nobody’s Fool, it has certain charm and hominess about it that made me enjoy reading it quite a bit, even it becoming a distraction during some hard times I have been having recently. I guess you can call it something of a personal favorite. It has some moments in it that I scoff at, but rarely, when I was reading through it, did I want to be somewhere else, even as depressing as the book gets. It has warmth about it that would make it perfect reading during the Christmas season when you are snowed in. The title refers to a small town in upstate New York that time is passing by. Shops are closing, people are dying, and to stick around is a certain death sentence for the soul. We first meet Harry, the owner of the Mohawk Grill, one of the last places around still open, as he protects Wild Bill, the local town idiot from a group of customers harassing him. It is a compassionate yet heartbreaking scene that sets the mood for the rest of the novel as we meet the central cast. Anne Grouse, the prettiest girl in Mohawk, has returned from an interesting life back to the doldrum of Mohawk to care for her sick father. Her son, Randall, is smart, but do to being ostracized by his class, has slowly and methodically been getting worse and worse grades. Finally, we meet Dallas Younger, Anne’s ex-husband and Randall’s father, a deadbeat on little to live for expect poker, alcohol, and the slim possibility of changing things with his family. This personal story acts as a backdrop to the larger happening in the town, such as a new hospital being built, the theft of leather at the local tannery, and who put a young junior high kid in the hospital. Like I said before, this book is not perfect by any means, and sort of lamely and haphazardly shifts time periods and even genres as the story goes on, but it never loses any of its charm, heart and wit as it chronicles the lives of broken people trying to fix their shattered lives with the weakest of glues. The ending is a bit anti-climatic, but that in no way defeats the purpose of the novel, which is to show the strength of people living on the edge between happiness and despair

Rating: 5/5