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Adult Books - Fiction - General Fiction
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Lark and Termite.
Phillips, Jayne Anne (author).
Jan. 2009. 272p. Knopf, hardcover, $24 (9780375401954).
REVIEW.
First published October 15, 2008 (Booklist).
Phillips, who made a big splash with Black Tickets (1979) and Machine Dreams (1986), has fallen somewhat off the literary radar but comes back full force with a new novel that certainly reminds us of her strength as a fiction writer. Set in her native West Virginia, the author places her multivoiced narrative in the 1950s. Several characters, all related, tell their version, or let the narrator tell it, of family life, beginning with Robert Leavitt, an army corporal stationed in Korea during that dreadful conflict. Leavitt dies tragically overseas, leaving behind a young widow and infant son. In alternating sections, Leavitt’s Korean experiences are chronicled, as are his survivors’ attempts to put together a family that can decently function without husband and father. Phillips’ understanding of each of her characters is typically immaculate. A sense of sluggishness in the novel’s first pages gives way to an appreciation of how moving this in-depth definition of what makes a family is. Expect demand from her fans; on the other hand, readers unfamiliar with her should be encouraged to make her acquaintance. — Brad Hooper
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