Reviews

The Brothers K by David James Duncan

dlberglund's review against another edition

2.0

Did you know this is a 700+ page book? I finally finished it. I'm glad that I did--the ending was well crafted and a good wrap up. But I wasn't happy with several hundred pages in the middle. I don't like the rambling on and on descriptions of the detailed loves and hobbies of every single character. I didn't love the first person narrator who sometimes becomes omnipresent and knows the intimate details of his brothers' letters, diaries and thoughts. I have been told I won't like The Brothers Karamazov. It is therefore not going on my "To be read" shelf.

dbarnett7's review against another edition

5.0

“It starts slow, then it gets good, then it wrecks you” A beautiful epic about what it means to be a family.

sethpalmer3's review against another edition

4.0

A slow burn with a beautiful ending. The first 450 pages build carefully but when the tide turns, it’s a heck of a reveal.

chawkinsknell's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional funny inspiring reflective sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I would have given this book 5 stars but it was a bit too slow for that. However, it made me think so much about family, brokenness, generational issues, dreams, values, etc., that I do recommend it to those who can get through the extensive baseball sections. 

lauresno's review against another edition

emotional funny hopeful inspiring reflective sad slow-paced

5.0

ngork032's review against another edition

5.0

This book… I laughed, I cried, I experienced this strange laugh-cry hybrid that made me have to set down the book for a few minutes and lose my spot on the page and have to reread the laugh-cry moment all over again and be happy for it.

patlo's review against another edition

5.0

If this isn't one of the Great American Novels, I'm not sure why not. It's an epic family saga. It's huge in its scope and its challenge, and in its impact.

I think I may prefer[b:The River Why|23196|The River Why|David James Duncan|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1167391170s/23196.jpg|993607] by the same author, but both are fantastic novels. This is more grand; Why is more philosophical.

I'll reread this one more than once (as I have with Why). Highly recommended.

hailbop's review against another edition

5.0

Grateful that a dear friend let me borrow this wonderful saga. I came into this book knowing it was my favorite professor's book. Reading it helped me understand him and his personal mission. I miss my friend and mentor, but The Brothers K helped me get to know some things about life, Jacoby, God, and baseball.

bookishlibrarian's review against another edition

5.0

 

July 2023 Re-read

David James Duncan’s new book, The Sun House, comes out next month, his first novel in 30 years, which finally prompted me to re-read The Brothers K, a book I first read and loved 15 years ago. And I'm sad I waited this long!

The Brothers K follows the Chance family–patriarch Hugh is a minor-league baseball legend–in the minds of his sons, if no one else. Mother Laura is a devout Seventh Day Adventist who runs the household with efficiency and some very tough love. Four boys–Everett, Peter, Irwin, and Kincaid–and twin sisters Bet and Freddy, round out the Chance clan. Their idyllic childhood of the 50s gives way to a much more tumultuous 60s as the Chance siblings come of age during the era of Vietnam. It would be a turbulent decade not only for the country, but also for the family, both individually and collectively, as each member of the Chance family begins to assert their independence and identity, with religion and politics often dividing them. What I especially loved:

Baseball:  In the earlier parts of the novel, especially, baseball is the connective tissue that holds the Chances together, in contrast to religion, which often divides them. Some of my favorite scenes in the book were of the brothers holed up in the hedge watching Papa Toe toss his Kamikaze pitches and “harelip prayers”, or Papa’s later stint pitching “stupid relief.”  I once wrote an essay for a nonfiction writing class about baseball as my “in” with the reticent males of my family. From watching baseball games with my grandpa, to playing catch with my dad, to sorting baseball cards with my brother, baseball was the source of some of my most treasured childhood memories and deepest feelings of connection with them. So seeing this play out in this novel particularly and personally resonated with me. A baseball quote:

“But there in his shed, Everett said, Papa was throwing more than just adrenaline: he was throwing his frustration, his anger, his dissolved hopes, his fear, his fatigue; he was taking everything inside him and just slinging it, helter-skelter, out into the night…And the more he missed the mattress, the louder he blasted the bare wall, the fiercer and deeper my love for him grew.”

Siblings: I really love stories that focus on siblings: how people can have the same parents and upbringing and environment, and grow into such different people. It was fascinating to see each Chance sibling diverge into their own selves, what they adhered to and what they discarded from their parents, and how they began to forge their own paths and identities, while still being very much shaped by where they came from. Another quote that captures this:

“Something precious was being taken from us, or squandered by us…To me it felt as though two old and intimate friends, after sixteen years spent hiking shoulder to shoulder, had come to a fork in the trail, and without even noticing had taken different paths. When they first looked up and saw what had happened, they were not at all far apart: they could still speak quietly to each other, could still see each other perfectly well. But they just kept going! All those years spent side by side, yet they didn’t hesitate, didn’t wave goodbye, didn’t even acknowledge that they’d parted! Somehow this chilled me to the heart. It seemed that only I understood that, blithe as their divergence had been, it was permanent. So as my big brothers hiked intrepidly on, I–the slow, over-round, over-adoring brother who’d spent his whole life traipsing happily along behind both of them–just stood back at the fork, watching them veer farther and farther apart, and grieving for us all.”

Faith, religion, and, spirituality: It explores faith in many different capacities and forms. I’m still pondering how all this shows up in the book and what its ultimate message is (in part, I guess due to my own messy thoughts and feelings in this arena) Different characters seem to all find faith in different places:  Papa’s baseball, Grandawma’s science, Mama’s rigid religious beliefs, Iriwin’s gentle, joyful faith, Elder Babcock’s judgment or Elder Joon’s service, Peter’s intellectualism, Everett’s activism–all are different ways of believing, of making sense of the world, of seeking answers, of self-understanding, of taking action, of showing up for others. And, at various times, these faiths serve them or shield them, connect and divide them from others, are both a way of seeing and a form of blindness. Oh hey, another quote:

“Personally I’m not sure just who or what Christ is. I still pray to Him in a pinch, but I talk to myself in a pinch too–and I’m getting less and less sure there is a difference. I used to wish somebody would just tell me what to think about Him. Then along came Elder Babcock, telling and telling, acting like Christ was running for President of the World, and he was His campaign manager, and whoever didn’t get out the votes we call tithes and offerings into the ballot boxes we call offering plates was a wretched turd of a sinner voting for Satan by default.”  And then this quote about the similarities between baseball and religion:

“So based on experience, I’m telling you guys; baseball and churches have got the same boredom factor, the same hypocrisy, the same Pie in a Big League Sky, the same bone-hard benches, the same loud-mouthed yo-yos mixed in among the decent fans in the pews, the same power-loving preacher/managers delivering the same damned ‘Do what I say or you’re doomed’ sermons. Hell, they’ve even got the same stinking organ music.”

K’s: I loved the section that included the many different definitions of K’s, or striking out: "To fail, to flunk, to fuck up, to fizzle. To fall short, fall apart, fall flat, fall by the wayside, or on deaf ears, or hard times, or into disrepute or disrepair”  The Brothers K is full of characters that are flawed but resilient, who make decisions and suffer consequences, who learn and grow, who come into conflict and reconcile, and overcome obstacles.  Another quote: "The man on the rock had pitched five outs in the losing game, and had given up two runs on a single. But he's inherited loaded bases. The story of his life. The story of all our lives." 

Love and care: I began this overlong and meandering review by talking about how this book is so full of life and love. And it was these moments that stick with me most:  Bet caring for Grandawma, Papa’s wild pitch, the way Papa both stood up to but also defended Mama and kept her secrets, several moments between Everett and Mama in the book’s last chapters, the way everyone rallied around Winnie. How love is an action as much as a feeling. From this quote:

“Our love for Irwin was no longer just a futile gnawing in our minds and chests. It was careening around the real world. It had lifted a pitch clean out of a stadium and a mother up onto a pew; it had inspired a church-hating agnostic to steal a pulpit, preach, and pray; it had hung an elder in the air by the back of his pants, had tried its flagrant and subtle best to get God’s attention, had even made the sports pages. Our love for Irwin had become an incarnate force..”

The writing: This book is over 600 pages but never felt that way. The writing is so vibrant, both playful and poignant, colorful and contemplative, fun and funny, and often very moving. I marked so many passages, of which the above are only a fraction. I read to think, to feel, to laugh, to cry, to be changed. This is one of the rare books that does all of it. I can’t wait to read The Sun House. 

kellieallen's review against another edition

5.0

David James Duncan’s writing glistens with divinity. I cannot recall being this powerfully moved by a book, maybe ever. It’s a story of life and the things we carry through it—things that break us and lift us, things that make the deep parts of us weep and the deeper parts of us exult. Hilarious and poignantly raw, this is a tale about the human condition, the families who raise us, the things we inherit from them along the way, and the way the whole human story, ultimately, just keeps ticking along.