Monday, January 7, 2013

Canada by Richard Ford

"First, I'll tell about the robbery our parents committed. Then about the murders, which happened later."

Richard Ford's philosophical novel, Canada, is told in the voice of Dell Parsons, looking back on the chain of events that began in Great Falls, Montana, when he and his twin sister were 15 years old. Their lives diverged when their parents were taken away in handcuffs. Berner ran away to San Francisco, while a family friend took Dell to a desolate small town in Saskatchewan.

"What I know is, you have a better chance in life -- of surviving it -- if you tolerate loss well, manage not to be a cynic through it all; to subordinate, as Ruskin implied, to keep proportion, to connect the unequal things into a whole that preserves the good, even if admittedly good is not simple to find."

I listened to the audiobook [Recorded Books; 13 hr, 45 min] skillfully performed by Holter Graham.

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