Daredevils: A Novel

Author: Vestal, Shawn

Edition: 1st

Number Of Pages: 320

Details:

From the winner of 2014’s PEN Robert W. Bingham Prize, an unforgettable debut novel about Loretta, a teenager married off as a “sister wife,” who makes a break for freedom  At the heart of this exciting debut novel, set in Arizona and Idaho in the mid-1970s, is fifteen-year-old Loretta, who slips out of her bedroom every evening to meet her so-called gentile boyfriend. Her strict Mormon parents catch her returning one night, and promptly marry her off to Dean Harder, a devout yet materialistic fundamentalist who already has a wife and a brood of kids. The Harders relocate to his native Idaho, where Dean’s teenage nephew Jason falls hard for Loretta. A Zeppelin and Tolkien fan, Jason worships Evel Knievel and longs to leave his close-minded community. He and Loretta make a break for it. They drive all night, stay in hotels, and relish their dizzying burst of teenage freedom as they seek to recover Dean’s cache of “Mormon gold.” But someone Loretta left behind is on their trail...  A riveting story of desire and escape, Daredevils boasts memorable set pieces and a rich cast of secondary characters. There’s Dean’s other wife, Ruth, who as a child in the 1950s was separated from her parents during the notorious Short Creek raid, when federal agents descended on a Mormon fundamentalist community. There’s Jason’s best friend, Boyd, part Native American and caught up in the activist spirit of the time, who comes along for the ride, with disastrous results. And Vestal’s ultimate creation is a superbly sleazy chatterbox—a man who might or might not be Evel Knievel himself—who works his charms on Loretta at a casino in Elko, Nevada. A lifelong journalist whose Spokesman column is a fixture in Spokane, WA, Shawn has honed his fiction over many years, publishing in journals like McSweeney's and Tin House. His stunning first collection, Godforsaken Idaho, burrowed into history as it engaged with masculinity and crime, faith and apostasy, and the West that he knows so well. Daredevils shows what he can do on a broader canvas--a fascinating, wide-angle portrait of a time and place that's both a classic coming of age tale and a plunge into the myths of America, sacred and profane. From School Library Journal When 15-year-old Loretta's parents catch her sneaking out at night in 1974 Arizona, they accept Dean Harder's offer to make her his second wife. In their reclusive fundamentalist Mormon community, sister wives help men fulfill the sacred principle of plural marriage. Meanwhile in Idaho, Dean's teenage nephew, Jason, works his more mainstream Mormon family's dairy farm and sneaks off with his grandpa to see Evel Knievel attempt to jump the Snake River Canyon in a steam-powered rocket. Both Loretta and Jason yearn for different lives, but it isn't until the whole family gathers after Grandpa's death that the two teens dare to escape together. Richly descriptive writing and third-person storytelling at first seem to create distance between the characters and readers, and chapters told from Knievel's egotistical first-person point of view are jarring at first. Also, the "ick" factor in the plot includes more than just underage polygamy. There is a violent jackrabbit drive, for example, that Dean organizes with other men to rid Grandpa's farm of the pests that are ruining his crops (they use fire to drive the rabbits into a chute and then bash them to death as they exit). Ultimately, however, the writing is beautiful and the many narrative layers form a subtle and satisfying exploration of courage, lunacy, righteousness, lust, and more. VERDICT Teens will appreciate this fascinating historical novel for the suspense and complexity of Loretta's and Jason's responses to situations created by the adults in their lives.—Hope Baugh, Carmel Clay Public Library, Carmel, IN

Reviews:

“Powerful…breathtaking and brash…[Vestal] makes his entrance as if he were already a seasoned pro, writing at full throttle and with relaxed...

EAN: 9781101979891

Release Date: 12-04-2016

Languages: English

Item Note: Great shape- pages are unmarked and sharp.Has a remainder mark. Hardcover Used - Like New Ships fast! 20161st

Item Condition: UsedLikeNew

Binding: Hardcover