Audiobook Review: The Enchanted

The Enchanted (2014)
Written by Rene Denfeld
Narrated by Jim Frangione
Run Time: 7 hours 4 minutes
Publisher: Harper Audio

A death-row prison may be the last place one would find "enchanted," but in Denfeld's novel, the prison is a mix of horrible reality and an escape for one prisoner as he contemplates death in his cell. A prison with golden horses and little men with tiny hammers may sound like they're more at home in a fantasy novel, but they play prominent roles in this one. That is, if you believe the narrator, an inmate kept in the darkest and most isolated part of the prison, isn't just making up a fantasy of his own.

Other characters include the Lady, an investigator who assists defense attorneys in trying to overturn death sentences, a fallen priest who starts to better understand the prisoners he has under his care as well as growing affections for the Lady, and a warden whose wife suffers from terminal cancer.

This is a hard book to review, because it depends on what you take into it. Some readers will get irritated by the lack of firm place (the place where the prison is located is never explicitly said, so it leaves a lot to the imagination) or the few named characters. However, as the book progressed, I realized that the book couldn't have much definition to it in order for it to work. Readers in book clubs will want to discuss whether the narrator is going mad and seeing these fantastical figures in his mind or whether this prison exists in a fantasy world or some other explanation. I found myself a few times still thinking about the imagery of the golden horses with molten manes well after the fact and not what was going on in the story.

The other thing that the book depends on is whatever your opinion is of the death penalty. Whether you're for or against it isn't the issue, but the book challenges those pre-conceived assertions from both sides, from the Lady's efforts to overturn an inmate's sentence to the reminders of the horrific crimes that these inmates did to get to death row. The narrator is likable and an avid reader, but then again, can someone be likable if they did such a horrendous crime?

The imagery is superb and the driving force of the novel. I really liked some of the characters, namely the Lady and the warden. Both of these characters have conflicted home lives and want to do the right thing, even if their job requires them to partake in the horrific.

Jim Frangione delivers a very good audio performance with a hard-scrabble tone. He manages to embody the narrator who, after seeing the horrors and wonder of life inside the prison walls, can alternate from sounding gruff to tender and back again.

Rating: 4/5 stars. It can be difficult to read at times and make readers question some of the fantastical elements long after they've turned the page, but the characters and descriptions kept me engaged and wanting to see more enchantment.

The Enchanted is available in hardcover, ebook and audio formats. A paperback version is set for publication this week.

Harper Lee News Jolts the World

When it was announced in December that Toni Morrison would have a new novel published in April (God Help the Child), the literary world was abuzz. But if the Toni Morrison news was a large wave, then consider the Harper Lee announcement Tuesday a full-blown earthquake.

HarperCollins will publish Lee's long-lost novel Go Set a Watchman July 14, her first since the 1960 publication of the classic To Kill a Mockingbird.

"In the mid-1950s, I completed a novel called Go Set a Watchman. It features the character known as Scout as an adult woman and I thought it a pretty decent effort. My editor, who was taken by the flashbacks to Scout's childhood, persuaded me to write a novel from the point of view of the young Scout," Lee said in the publisher's press release. "I was a first-time writer, so I did as I was told. I hadn't realized it had survived, so I was surprised and delighted when my dear friend and lawyer Tonja Carter discovered it. After much thought and hesitation I shared it with a handful of people I trust and was pleased to hear that they considered it worthy of publication. I am humbled and amazed that this will now be published after all these years."

The press release also said that the manuscript was found attached to an original typescript of Lee's classic novel. In Go Set a Watchman, Scout will be heading back to Maycomb, Alabama 20 years after the events of To Kill a Mockingbird to visit her father Atticus. At this point, it would be the 1950s (Mockingbird takes place during the Great Depression), so issues of race in a small Southern town will likely play a role as well as the continued relationship between father and daughter.

I first read Mockingbird the spring semester of my freshman year of high school. In the fall, we had read John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men and I did not care for it. My honors English teacher, Mr. Webb, was effusive toward both Steinbeck and Lee. As is the unfortunate norm today, the class was skeptical about reading them. Reading Lee's novel was a delight for me and most of the class agreed. It was through his class that I read Lee's terrific novel and saw the film adaptation starring Gregory Peck, featuring one of my favorite scenes ever, Atticus' closing argument.

The book has been the target of bans over the years and been called naive and idealistic in some circles, which I completely disagree. The novel's essence is about growing up and realizing things don't always work out the way they should because of accepted societal horrors like institutional racism. After all, if it were truly idealistic, Tom Robinson would have been set free in the end.

Lee, left, is famously private, so any news regarding her is big news. One of her more recent public appearances was in 2007 when she received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President George W. Bush. In 2010, she was awarded the National Medal of Arts by President Barack Obama. Last year, former Chicago Tribune reporter Marja Mills wrote a memoir about living next to Lee, who vehemently blasted it on multiple occasions. The literary world is still split on the merits of that book (I have opted not to read it), but it speaks to the general public's desire for more from Lee, since she only wrote one published novel. Thanks to the discovery of the Watchman manuscript, we get to go back to Maycomb as Lee originally wrote it and on her own terms. You can bet that I'll be reading it this summer.

Already, people are speculating as to whether or not it will be able to be successful in the shadow of Mockingbird. Thankfully for me, it has been years since I read Lee's original masterpiece, so I plan to read the sequel first, then the original, so as to not taint the newer novel.