Book Review: Then Came the Evening by Brian Hart
Then Came the Evening
Brian Hart
Bloomsbury Publishing, 2009
9781608190140
ARC from Goodreads‘ First Reads giveaway
Sleep would not come easy this time and he knew it as soon as he blinked and opened his eyes and there was no difference between the two. He began and suffered through an inventory of the reasons why he should leave and why he shouldn’t be allowed to be out at all. He wondered if regret would ever relax its hold on him. It doesn’t have to be that way, he told himself. Sleep and tomorrow you can be a new man, a free man.
Over the course of a single night, Bandy Dorner loses everything: his home, his pregnant wife, and, after gunning down a cop in a drunken rage, his freedom. Twenty years later, Bandy’s given the opportunity to start over from scratch.
I’ve put off writing this review because I’m still not sure what I think of Then Came the Evening. In general, I’d say it’s a good book; on Goodreads I gave it 3 stars, though I lean more towards 3.5. The descriptions of Idaho are well-done, the characters are mostly well-drawn, and the writing style did not fall victim to clichés and clutter, though I did have issues with sentence structure at times. While Then Came the Evening bears some of the hallmarks of a first novel, I also think it reveals genuine potential, and believe (and hope) that Brian Hart has a long and successful writing career ahead of him.
I cannot wholeheartedly recommend Then Came the Evening, however. More than anything, the passivity of the three main characters left me unsatisfied when I finished reading. Iona and Tracy at times show a hint of drive, but Bandy’s almost complete surrender to circumstance nearly overshadows everything. Things just happen to him, and his response speaks of futility more than any other emotion. Sometimes being a victim of circumstance or being swept along by the current of life can make for compelling fiction, but this is not one of those times. I pity Bandy, but I don’t care about him.
I also found Iona’s characterization weak in comparison to those of Bandy and Tracy. I never got a sense for what motivates her to make the choices she does; while I appreciate not being subjected to several hundred pages of navel-gazing, I was left with more questions than answers by the end.
I think the comparisons to Cormac McCarthy I’ve seen on Goodreads and Amazon misrepresent both McCarthy and Hart. While the bleakness of both the narrative and the landscape does bear some resemblance to McCarthy, what distinguishes McCarthy in my mind is his use of the monstrous and the grotesque in his writing. There’s nothing truly grotesque or monstrous about Then Came the Evening; it’s just bleak and empty and stripped almost completely bare of hope. In that respect, comparisons to Annie Proulx might be more appropriate.
Despite my reservations about Then Came the Evening, I believe that Brian Hart shows potential, and look forward to further works from him.
Reviewed by Laura Taylor, March 2010, on Beyond the Blurb; reprinted here with permission.
May 5, 2010
Tags: Bloomsbury, general fiction Posted in: Full Reviews
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5 Responses
I’m always the most interested in books with flaws such as you describe, I think. Did the acquiring editor just not agree that these things were flaws? Did something else balance them out (as you say, writing style, vividness of setting, etc.)? As a writer with a novel on sub, I can attest to the fact that the editors who view my work seem to have the sharpest of eyes. We’ve gotten suggestions for revision (which indeed led to a better book) that seem exacting to say the least. I appreciate this process, even before publication. But then I wonder how other things persist in novels, which reviewers go on to spot?
At the risk of sounding like I’m resorting to a cop-out, I think subjectivity is an imporant factor to consider. Editors, by virtue of their professions, are probably better at setting their personal preferences aside and focusing on whether or not authorial choices contribute to a better narrative. I believe there are also many reviewers – both professional and amateur – who are equally capable of recognizing the difference between “Do I like this?” and “Does this work on a structural level?” While I strive for a balanced assessment, at the same time I’m conscious that I have strong likes and dislikes, and try to point those out, but also try to explain *why* I react one way or the other. In this case, I just couldn’t connect with the characters, which is important to me; someone else might say that what I describe as their passivity contributes to the bleakness of the overall story, and thus is appropriate to what the author was aiming for, and so they’ll have a higher opinion of the book than I did.
I appreciate your reply, Laura. It’s that subjectivity factor that keeps hanging me up. I know it’s there and that what you say is right. But there persists in my mind the idea (fantasy?) that if the book is strong enough, everyone will have to agree it’s a great read.
Universal appeal is an attractive ideal to aim for, I agree. You’ll probably drive yourself crazy trying to accomplish it, though – probably better to figure out what your audience is, aim for them, and sod the rest.
Well, crazy as I’ve been driven, I should probably take your eminently practical advice–and thanks again for the fascinating post!
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