The Heart of It All by Christian Kiefer
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
“In some life other than this one, his words might have been condescending, but what she knew, beyond his touch, beyond the warmth of it, the feeling of his hand so gentle upon her, was that he had just said two words her mother had never said to her and never would. And it was all she had ever wanted to hear. Nothing less. Nothing more.”
This is one of the best novels I’ve read this year. It’s about several families in a small town. A local factory owner, several workers in the factory, their families, workers in the local grocery store and how their lives intertwine and how they hold each other and help each other through grief and loneliness and form a community.
There’s so much covered here: immigration, loss, grief, racism, sexism, patriotism, politics, love, family, loneliness, poverty, drugs, i can go on and on. None of it feels too much, though, it just feels like ordinary people going about their ordinary lives.
“She did not know how to tell them how much these nights meant to her and did not want to admit that they had had such meaning, that bowling had saved her from a loneliness so deeply rooted in her soul that she had ceased to think of it as something that could change but instead had come to understand that it was the very center of her, that she would always feel this way, that she would always be alone. “
The characters are three-dimensional and real and flawed and you can’t help but love each of them and their vulnerability and the difficulties they are having to endure. I loved spending time with them. I rooted for each of them, cheered them on, laughed out loud and cried and cried.
“And there they were at the heart of it all: himself and, just ahead, his father and his son, the two of them laughing, talking lightly about dinner now, about their day in Columbus. Khalid knew he would remember this moment all his life and he wondered if Rashid too would recall it one day, perhaps when he was Khalid’s age and had children of his own, time wheeling on and the people who ran upon that wheel plucking an occasional moment from its turning like a pearl stolen from the sea. That he had once been Rashid’s age was difficult to fathom.”
I will not forget this book for a long, long time. Highly recommended.
with gratitude to edelweiss and Melville House for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.
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