| Title | Absolution |
| Author | Alice McDermott |
| Copyright | 2023 |
| Type | Fiction |
| Length | 338 pages |
| Finished Reading | April 24, 2024 |
| Notable | New York Times bestseller A Best Book of the Year by Time, Esquire, Good Housekeeping Kirkus Reviews, LA Times, NPR, Oprah Daily and Vogue. |
| Ratings | Personal: 4 stars GoodReads: 3.8 (15,767 Ratings) Amazon: 4.2 (3,612 Ratings) |
Alice McDermott’s novels are powerful yet subtle. I knew I was in for a ride reading the epigraphs which start the novel.
“The anguish of the earth absolves our eyes …”
Siegfried Sassoon “Absolution”
“… but how I wished there existed someone to whom I could say that I was sorry.”
Graham Greene, The Quiet American
We have two stories: one layered on the other. The first layer is the relationship (I don’t think I would call it a friendship) between Patricia Kelly and Charlene, who meet in 1963 Vietnam where their husbands are advisors prior to the full blown escalation to come. They are complete opposites:
“It wasn’t merely that everyone in the American community in Saigon, the other women at least, were sick to death of smarter-than-they-were Charlene. It was that Charlene was complex and I, to all observers was simple”.
Page 153
The novel’s narrative is through written correspondence between Patricia and Charlene’s daughter, Rainey, who is now an adult. Through the letters we are provided a view of the more innocent time when most women followed their husbands without question or input. But not Charlene.
Where Patricia is a newlywed, and dutiful wife, Charlene works outside her husband’s influence to provide assistance to the Vietnamese civilians – especially children – who are injured or I’ll. Just as Patricia followed her husband to Vietnam without complaint – or even the thought she could have input – she falls easily into Charlene’s group.
“‘And this is handmade,’ I felt her slip her fingers under my elbow. She pulled me closer. We were suddenly, all unaccountably, a united front; for or against what I still had no idea. But I confess to some satisfaction in knowing I had won her over, if that’s what I’d done. It was another inborn talent of these privileged girls: they were irresistible, much as you hated them.”
Page 21.
It is interesting we don’t hear from Charlene directly – in fact, I don’t think we even learn her last name. All we know of her comes from Patricia’s and Rainey’s memories. We can’t help but wonder what motivated Charlene; we have to piece it all together through the correspondence.
The second layer is the effort of helping the Vietnamese civilians. Charlene’s plans are all designed to help the civilians caught in the middle of the building war. A recurring phrase in the book is “inconsequential good”. Charlene, and Patricia, work on regardless of the fact that the problems and suffering are so much more than they can fix. There is a scene in the children’s hospital where Patricia reaches out to help a young girl who was terribly burned – by what Patricia later realized was napalm. It’s a harrowing scene of pain and a small effort to comfort. I get a bit teary reading through those pages again now as I write this.
The second half of the novel is centered around Rainey, and Dominic who, by chance, lived next door to Rainey’s new summer home. Dom was a Conscientious Objector in the war and worked in the hospital where Charlene and Patricia helped. Seeing Dominic’s relationship with this son who has Down’s Syndrome, is so tender. Inconsequential good is at play here as well.
I love that this novel let women tell their story of the Vietnam War.
