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Detective Sunderson #2
The Big Seven
Jim Harrison is one of our most renowned and popular authors, and his last novel, The Great Leader , was one of the most successful in a decorated it appeared on the New York Times extended bestseller list, and was a national bestseller with rapturous reviews. His darkly comic follow-up, The Big Seven , sends Detective Sunderson to confront his new neighbors, a gun-nut family who live outside the law in rural Michigan.
Detective Sunderson has fled troubles on the home front and bought himself a hunting cabin in a remote area of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. No sooner has he settled in than he realizes his new neighbors are creating even more havoc than the Great Leader did. A family of outlaws, armed to the teeth, the Ameses have local law enforcement too intimidated to take them on. Then Sunderson’s cleaning lady, a comely young Ames woman, is murdered, and black sheep brother Lemuel Ames seeks Sunderson’s advice on a crime novel he’s writing which may not be fiction. Sunderson must struggle with the evil within himself and the far greater, more expansive evil of his neighbor.
In a story shot through with wit, bedlam, and Sunderson’s attempts to enumerate and master the seven deadly sins, The Big Seven is a superb reminder of why Jim Harrison is one of America’s most irrepressible writers.
Detective Sunderson has fled troubles on the home front and bought himself a hunting cabin in a remote area of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. No sooner has he settled in than he realizes his new neighbors are creating even more havoc than the Great Leader did. A family of outlaws, armed to the teeth, the Ameses have local law enforcement too intimidated to take them on. Then Sunderson’s cleaning lady, a comely young Ames woman, is murdered, and black sheep brother Lemuel Ames seeks Sunderson’s advice on a crime novel he’s writing which may not be fiction. Sunderson must struggle with the evil within himself and the far greater, more expansive evil of his neighbor.
In a story shot through with wit, bedlam, and Sunderson’s attempts to enumerate and master the seven deadly sins, The Big Seven is a superb reminder of why Jim Harrison is one of America’s most irrepressible writers.
352 pages, Hardcover
First published January 6, 2015
220 people are currently reading
1045 people want to read
About the author
Jim Harrison
185 books1,491 followersJim Harrison was born in Grayling, Michigan, to Winfield Sprague Harrison, a county agricultural agent, and Norma Olivia (Wahlgren) Harrison, both avid readers. He married Linda King in 1959 with whom he has two daughters.
Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.
His awards include National Academy of Arts grants (1967, 68, 69), a Guggenheim Fellowship (1969-70), the Spirit of the West Award from the Mountain & Plains Booksellers Association, and election to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2007).
Much of Harrison's writing depicts sparsely populated regions of North America with many stories set in places such as Nebraska's Sand Hills, Michigan's Upper Peninsula, Montana's mountains, and along the Arizona-Mexico border.
Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.
His awards include National Academy of Arts grants (1967, 68, 69), a Guggenheim Fellowship (1969-70), the Spirit of the West Award from the Mountain & Plains Booksellers Association, and election to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2007).
Much of Harrison's writing depicts sparsely populated regions of North America with many stories set in places such as Nebraska's Sand Hills, Michigan's Upper Peninsula, Montana's mountains, and along the Arizona-Mexico border.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 211 reviews
December 15, 2015
Sigh. Once upon a time Jim Harrison could craft a beautiful English sentence. Now he recycles characters, transparent alter egos, who tell us what wine they are drinking at the moment - Priorat, Barolo, Gigondas; how much garlic is in the scampi; and whether they catch two rainbow trout and one brown trout, or two brown trout and one rainbow trout. I opened a Montepulciano to go with a green chile stew, raised the volume on the Jeff Ballard Trio, and did not look for hidden meanings.
This is Detective Sunderson, who we've seen before in The Great Leader. There, Sunderson tracked down a cult; here, a violent family. The title refers to the seven deadly sins and Sunderson thinks he will add an eighth: violence. Cormac McCarthy has done this much better. So too, Harrison unintentionally offers, did Shakespeare: We are nature too.
This is subtitled A Faux Mystery. It felt more like a faux book.
Sad, really.
This is Detective Sunderson, who we've seen before in The Great Leader. There, Sunderson tracked down a cult; here, a violent family. The title refers to the seven deadly sins and Sunderson thinks he will add an eighth: violence. Cormac McCarthy has done this much better. So too, Harrison unintentionally offers, did Shakespeare: We are nature too.
This is subtitled A Faux Mystery. It felt more like a faux book.
Sad, really.
August 11, 2023
I love Jim Harrison. I hated this book. A long apparent apologia for alcoholism and old men having sex with young women (and girls), the protagonist’s excuses and mild self-condemnation prevented neither his doing such things repeatedly nor a sense of distaste in the reader. I really looked forward to this book. A couple chapters in, I really looked forward to it being over.
Never figured a Jim Harrison book would be a waste of time.
Never figured a Jim Harrison book would be a waste of time.
January 14, 2015
I find it somewhat surprising that of the few reviews posted here so far the majority are from first-time Harrison readers. As a long, long time fan of JH, and one who has read nearly every word the man has written, including his wonderful poetry, I have to say this is not the best book to judge as an introduction to one of literature's great assets. Read 'Dalva' or 'Wolf' or 'Sundog, or even 'True North' - such novels when, sad to say, Harrison was truly Harrison.
While always a grammatical and punctuational rebel, a lot of the prose here seems a bit too loose (I just can't bring myself to say sloppy, yet there it is), even for a lovable rebel. Perhaps the fullness of a life lived hard is catching up to my favorite author. And it pains me greatly to report this.
Our introduction to Sunderson in 'The Great Leader' just a few short years ago was a much stronger and tighter novel than we find in 'The Big Seven,' which often seems akin to listening to an elderly uncle relate his old stories over and over as Sunderston stumbles through his missteps of 'solving' this mystery-less mystery.
Yes, this all sounds harsh and it is. But then it's Harrison and he's set the bar high over a lifetime of writing an incredibly rich and diverse body of work. This isn't to say there aren't flashes here and there of the magic and magnificence that we have come to expect. Is this his best work? Of course not. Yet Harrison's 'worst' is by far better than much of what is published today. And as long as he keeps writing, I'll keep reading. Did I mention the height of that bar? Now, let's talk about that long-neglected American Nobel.
While always a grammatical and punctuational rebel, a lot of the prose here seems a bit too loose (I just can't bring myself to say sloppy, yet there it is), even for a lovable rebel. Perhaps the fullness of a life lived hard is catching up to my favorite author. And it pains me greatly to report this.
Our introduction to Sunderson in 'The Great Leader' just a few short years ago was a much stronger and tighter novel than we find in 'The Big Seven,' which often seems akin to listening to an elderly uncle relate his old stories over and over as Sunderston stumbles through his missteps of 'solving' this mystery-less mystery.
Yes, this all sounds harsh and it is. But then it's Harrison and he's set the bar high over a lifetime of writing an incredibly rich and diverse body of work. This isn't to say there aren't flashes here and there of the magic and magnificence that we have come to expect. Is this his best work? Of course not. Yet Harrison's 'worst' is by far better than much of what is published today. And as long as he keeps writing, I'll keep reading. Did I mention the height of that bar? Now, let's talk about that long-neglected American Nobel.
December 30, 2014
*I received a review copy of this e-book from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.*
This is my first novel by Jim Harrison and I really enjoyed it. I have also purchased his famous Legends of the Fall and am looking forward to reading his catalog. It is always great to find a new (to me) author that I enjoy.
The Big Seven is two things. First of all, it is a very good crime story. This was my favorite part and it comprises about the first 75% of the story. Secondly, this novel is a character study of its deeply flawed narrator, an aging alcoholic who at the age of 65 has now developed an irresistible impulse to crawl into bed with any woman he encounters, especially very young ones. Phillip Roth often writes about this same type of character, as did Joyce Carroll Oates’ in her brilliant novella Patricide. Neither of these novelists treat the character with any undue amount of sympathy, and Harrison is no different.
I read this book in just a little more than a day. Despite the fact that it is quite deep and introspective at times it remains a compelling read and a cracking good crime storyline really provides quite a bit of entertainment. Somehow along the way Harrison manages to delve into what makes good fiction and art, famous writers (mainly Hemingway—who is similar to our narrator and not just for their mutual love of fishing, and Faulkner who may be the writer our narrator wishes he could be), the atrocities of war and deep introspection into the mental processes and development of our largely unlikeable narrator. It is amazing how much is in here. I know that I will be thinking about this novel long after I have finished it.
My only gripe is that after the crime drama has reached its conclusion the novel really unravels from a narrative point of view and got to the point of navel gazing by our narrator who can’t seem to focus on much of anything. Perhaps that was the point all along. Without a crime to provide focus, our narrator is a drifting lost soul who can’t decide if he wants to enter a monastery or buy another drink or pursue another woman. He knows what he should do and where he should be, but doesn’t seem very compelled to get there. Maybe it is my frustration with the character and not the novel. I will have to think about it a bit more before I decide.
For now I will hunt up my copy of Legends of the Fall because this Harrison guy is a damn good writer.
This is my first novel by Jim Harrison and I really enjoyed it. I have also purchased his famous Legends of the Fall and am looking forward to reading his catalog. It is always great to find a new (to me) author that I enjoy.
The Big Seven is two things. First of all, it is a very good crime story. This was my favorite part and it comprises about the first 75% of the story. Secondly, this novel is a character study of its deeply flawed narrator, an aging alcoholic who at the age of 65 has now developed an irresistible impulse to crawl into bed with any woman he encounters, especially very young ones. Phillip Roth often writes about this same type of character, as did Joyce Carroll Oates’ in her brilliant novella Patricide. Neither of these novelists treat the character with any undue amount of sympathy, and Harrison is no different.
I read this book in just a little more than a day. Despite the fact that it is quite deep and introspective at times it remains a compelling read and a cracking good crime storyline really provides quite a bit of entertainment. Somehow along the way Harrison manages to delve into what makes good fiction and art, famous writers (mainly Hemingway—who is similar to our narrator and not just for their mutual love of fishing, and Faulkner who may be the writer our narrator wishes he could be), the atrocities of war and deep introspection into the mental processes and development of our largely unlikeable narrator. It is amazing how much is in here. I know that I will be thinking about this novel long after I have finished it.
My only gripe is that after the crime drama has reached its conclusion the novel really unravels from a narrative point of view and got to the point of navel gazing by our narrator who can’t seem to focus on much of anything. Perhaps that was the point all along. Without a crime to provide focus, our narrator is a drifting lost soul who can’t decide if he wants to enter a monastery or buy another drink or pursue another woman. He knows what he should do and where he should be, but doesn’t seem very compelled to get there. Maybe it is my frustration with the character and not the novel. I will have to think about it a bit more before I decide.
For now I will hunt up my copy of Legends of the Fall because this Harrison guy is a damn good writer.
November 16, 2025
This is the second and final book in the Detective Sunderson series. Harrison died a year later, or presumably there would have been more.
I was kind of enchanted by Harrison's meandering style in the first book, The Great Leader. Sunderson spent as much time musing about books and reading as he did tracking down criminals. There's also a lot of musing about books and reading in this one. Sunderson has read "a brief smattering of Paul Tillich and Reinhold Niebuhr at the public library", William Carlos Williams, Elaine Pagels, Shelby Foote, Civilization and its Discontents, and The Poems of Jesus Christ by Willis Barnstone. His ex-wife Diane is reading Ada by Nabokov.
But Harrison's writing desperately needed a stricter editor, an editor who understood the role of commas:
"It was early on the warmest morning of the year when Lemuel dropped Kate off for fishing continuing on to Escanaba to see his broker or so he said driving off."
"Did they know something about women we refuse to admit he wondered?" Does this mean: "Did they know something about women we refuse to admit, he wondered?" Or does it mean, "Did they know something about women, we refuse to admit he wondered?"
Sunderson was very horny in the first book. He's even hornier in this one. I was copiously, heinously skeeved. Let's get an overview:
1. I lost count of the number of teenage girls and young 20-somethings Sunderson fucked.
2. All of these girls are super horny, and not for males their own age but for a 66-year-old.
3. For most of the novel Sunderson is in a relationship with a 19-year-old girl (a member of the violent, bestial Michigan family he's investigating). He introduces this girl to his mother, sister, and ex-wife, who all give the relationship their blessing.
4. At the beginning of the novel Sunderson fucks his adopted daughter. This is the girl, Mona, who lived next door in the first novel. Sunderson would pull aside a book on his library shelves to watch her do nude yoga in her house. At the end of the first novel Sunderson and Diane adopted Mona, whose parents were negligent. Now Mona has dropped out of college and fled to Paris with a rock musician. Sunderson chases after her. He finds her, they fall asleep in his hotel room, and he awakes to find her fellating him.
Diane is upset by this. But only briefly! Soon Sunderson and Diane are on a camping trip and they are fucking.
5. There's also a 14-year-old member of the violent Michigan family (who is so small and underfed she looks 12) who is constantly trying to seduce Sunderson. Sunderson is sorely, sorely tempted - she's always shedding her clothes - but doesn't succumb.
6. In addition, the new neighbor lady next door also does nude yoga (what are the chances??) and Sunderson again pulls the book aside to watch her. She is married but so horny that she and Sunderson are soon fucking.
I mean, yes: this is a book about the seven deadly sins (and what Sunderson calls the eighth, violence). But it reads like a big fat old man's fantasy, not realism.
November 8, 2021
Now that I have listened to this book in the audible format I have upgraded my star count from 3 to 4 actually primarily based on the last 20 or 30 pages of this book which I think finally rate some thing better than a mediocre appreciation.
I have been reading Jim Harrison books back to back to back. Obviously one year ago I had a fixation On this author based on my past positive experience. My current experience has been far less than positive. The books I have been reading currently seem to be about a sex crazed alcoholic in his older years fascinated with younger women for some reason.
I have been reading Jim Harrison books back to back to back. Obviously one year ago I had a fixation On this author based on my past positive experience. My current experience has been far less than positive. The books I have been reading currently seem to be about a sex crazed alcoholic in his older years fascinated with younger women for some reason.
January 25, 2015
I received a copy of this book from NetGalley.
The Big Seven could just as easily been entitled The State of My Erection. I have read several of Harrison's novels in the past, including the recent collection of novellas Brown Dog and enjoyed all of them. This was hard to even finish. Every other page was about the horny old retired detective having sex with young-waay too young women, thinking about it, eyeballing his neighbor, having sex with her, thinking about sex with his ex wife, thinking about thinking about sex, occasionally interspersed with fishing, drinking and let us not forget murder and incest.
I admire Harrison's facility with prose and hope that his next work is worth my time.
The Big Seven could just as easily been entitled The State of My Erection. I have read several of Harrison's novels in the past, including the recent collection of novellas Brown Dog and enjoyed all of them. This was hard to even finish. Every other page was about the horny old retired detective having sex with young-waay too young women, thinking about it, eyeballing his neighbor, having sex with her, thinking about sex with his ex wife, thinking about thinking about sex, occasionally interspersed with fishing, drinking and let us not forget murder and incest.
I admire Harrison's facility with prose and hope that his next work is worth my time.
February 22, 2015
Ugg, an insult to Yoopers. I couldn't stand Sunderson. My immediate thought was he was just a drunk dirty old man. If anything my opinion of him went down as I read. I'm amazed so many people had good things to say about it. I am hoping I missed something but I didn't find the point to the story. About 200 pages in I declared it a waste of my time. My husband told me there might be a good surprise ending, my response "ya, maybe he dies". Sorry, I hated it.
February 28, 2015
Great characterization. Reminds me of a cross between John Irving and Jack Cady (two of my favorite writers.) Looking forward to more by Jim Harrison.
October 16, 2015
The title refers to the 7 deadly sins, a topic that is preoccupying Detective Sunderson now he's retired. That is, when he's not mourning the demise of his 40 year marriage to Diane or lusting after every woman he comes across young enough to be his grand daughter.
Early on in the story, he attempts to rescue his adopted daughter from a drug addled rock star through a blackmail scheme. He comes home without the daughter but scores the cash & buys a cabin in upper Michigan. There he decides he will spend his days fishing & reflecting on the sorry state of his life.
In short order he find himself embroiled in the lives of the Ames, a neighbouring family who redefines dysfunctional. It's rather telling that the most civilized & cultured of the group is the one who spent the most time in prison. Their compound is a hotbed of incest, domestic violence, rape, child abuse & alcoholism. He befriends (and beds) two of the young women but things get a little complicated when the men start dying at an alarming rate. Despite being retired, he plays an active role in the investigations...when he's not fishing or having sex with other women.
Much of the story is taken up by his relationship with the Ames & the eventual resolution of the murders. But don't mistake this for a suspense filled thriller. Even Sunderson himself seems oddly blasé about all the violence around him, preferring to bow to the whims & demands of the women in his life, meekly following their lead. The crimes occur mostly off page & are quickly glossed over, sparing us the graphic details. But almost more disturbing are passages where the girls describe their role as sex toys for brothers, fathers, uncles & cousins in the calm, matter of fact manner of discussing the weather.
Through all this, Sunderson ponders where it all went wrong & why he can't seem to keep his pants zipped. During countless trips down memory lane & tangential musings, we accompany him as he recalls childhood friends, his mother, cases from his career, a pet dog, his courtship of Diane, thoughts on the Civil War & Siege of Leningrad, the history of Mexican dance, boa constrictors, food in general & poetry.
These continue as it evolves into a road book & he travels to Arizona, New York, Mexico, Paris, Barcelona & Seville. Dialogue is kept to a minimum & the only voice we hear is his as we hang out in his head.
After the Ames affair is resolved, Diane plays a larger role & her character injects some reason & insight. It's easy to understand why she divorced him but difficult to believe she could forgive one episode in particular & give him another chance. There are hints their relationship may shift but just as this begins to build the book abruptly ends.
This is a book that may provoke polarized reviews as it all hinges on whether or not you like Sunderson. The reader is with him 24/7 with no alternative voice to provide relief or different viewpoints. I grew tired of his constant whinging & (superficial) soul searching for the reasons behind his failings when he is clearly the author of his present situation. Despite all the mental meanderings, he's the same person at the end as when we started this journey....a 66 year old peeping Tom with too much time on his hands & no moral compass to point him in a new direction.
So I'm left with that dissatisfying feeling of "I don't get it". Perhaps I just don't share the author's sense of humour or I had trouble with some of the subject matter being told in such a light tone. As so often is the case, it all boils down to personal preference so you'll have to pick it up & decide for yourself whether Sunderson is someone you enjoy spending time with.
My thanks to Netgalley for providing an advance copy in exchange for an honest review.
Early on in the story, he attempts to rescue his adopted daughter from a drug addled rock star through a blackmail scheme. He comes home without the daughter but scores the cash & buys a cabin in upper Michigan. There he decides he will spend his days fishing & reflecting on the sorry state of his life.
In short order he find himself embroiled in the lives of the Ames, a neighbouring family who redefines dysfunctional. It's rather telling that the most civilized & cultured of the group is the one who spent the most time in prison. Their compound is a hotbed of incest, domestic violence, rape, child abuse & alcoholism. He befriends (and beds) two of the young women but things get a little complicated when the men start dying at an alarming rate. Despite being retired, he plays an active role in the investigations...when he's not fishing or having sex with other women.
Much of the story is taken up by his relationship with the Ames & the eventual resolution of the murders. But don't mistake this for a suspense filled thriller. Even Sunderson himself seems oddly blasé about all the violence around him, preferring to bow to the whims & demands of the women in his life, meekly following their lead. The crimes occur mostly off page & are quickly glossed over, sparing us the graphic details. But almost more disturbing are passages where the girls describe their role as sex toys for brothers, fathers, uncles & cousins in the calm, matter of fact manner of discussing the weather.
Through all this, Sunderson ponders where it all went wrong & why he can't seem to keep his pants zipped. During countless trips down memory lane & tangential musings, we accompany him as he recalls childhood friends, his mother, cases from his career, a pet dog, his courtship of Diane, thoughts on the Civil War & Siege of Leningrad, the history of Mexican dance, boa constrictors, food in general & poetry.
These continue as it evolves into a road book & he travels to Arizona, New York, Mexico, Paris, Barcelona & Seville. Dialogue is kept to a minimum & the only voice we hear is his as we hang out in his head.
After the Ames affair is resolved, Diane plays a larger role & her character injects some reason & insight. It's easy to understand why she divorced him but difficult to believe she could forgive one episode in particular & give him another chance. There are hints their relationship may shift but just as this begins to build the book abruptly ends.
This is a book that may provoke polarized reviews as it all hinges on whether or not you like Sunderson. The reader is with him 24/7 with no alternative voice to provide relief or different viewpoints. I grew tired of his constant whinging & (superficial) soul searching for the reasons behind his failings when he is clearly the author of his present situation. Despite all the mental meanderings, he's the same person at the end as when we started this journey....a 66 year old peeping Tom with too much time on his hands & no moral compass to point him in a new direction.
So I'm left with that dissatisfying feeling of "I don't get it". Perhaps I just don't share the author's sense of humour or I had trouble with some of the subject matter being told in such a light tone. As so often is the case, it all boils down to personal preference so you'll have to pick it up & decide for yourself whether Sunderson is someone you enjoy spending time with.
My thanks to Netgalley for providing an advance copy in exchange for an honest review.
April 9, 2018
This is more retired detective Sunderson awash in butts&nuts as he wades through a reckoning with the seven deadly sins as backdrop to more post career detective type savior escapades this time in France where he can also bludgeon us with food, drink, sex and art. What else but more Harrison gone wild at his epicurean banquet that's never ending. Jim Morrison was known as the "Lizard King" who died nefariously in Paris and who gorged on life whilst shadowing himself - Jim Harrison I'm calling the "Buzzard King" for reasons similar albeit a seasoned as in grizzled version which Morrison may have resembled if given that much rope of time to fully unravel the decrepitude of Harrison. We all make those beds we sleep in now don't we? RIP boys will be boys Boys!
March 9, 2015
Harrison has been writing and thinking about us humans and the places we have made in the earth for a long time, so long in fact, maybe, he has reverted to shorthand to tell our terrible stories of love and horror. donald hall uses short hand too in his new oldsters-words-of-wisdom Essays After Eighty
in this, set in U.p. michigan, an ex cop decides to buy a cabin in the woods and just fuck and go fishing after his 40 year marriage goes south, his career goes sought, and his liver is crying uncle.
harrison writes a book where the reader (well, this reader anyway) wants to join along and drink gallons of booze everyday, and smoke endless packs of cigs, and oh, have one, or two, or so 19 year old lovers.
annnnd sort of solve the crime of a huge family of redneck terrorists, annnd seriously think about the 7 deadly sins, plus a new one, violence. especially his own violence against the public, his friends, his family, himself.
the question of violence and why it is not a deadly sin, and is there a cure for it remains unanswered at this time.
but there were tapas in the story and something called pasties.
in this, set in U.p. michigan, an ex cop decides to buy a cabin in the woods and just fuck and go fishing after his 40 year marriage goes south, his career goes sought, and his liver is crying uncle.
harrison writes a book where the reader (well, this reader anyway) wants to join along and drink gallons of booze everyday, and smoke endless packs of cigs, and oh, have one, or two, or so 19 year old lovers.
annnnd sort of solve the crime of a huge family of redneck terrorists, annnd seriously think about the 7 deadly sins, plus a new one, violence. especially his own violence against the public, his friends, his family, himself.
the question of violence and why it is not a deadly sin, and is there a cure for it remains unanswered at this time.
but there were tapas in the story and something called pasties.
March 7, 2015
I have read Harrison for 30 years and remember aching at Sun Dog's brutal cleanness of writing. Unfortunately Harrison is weakening with every book now. The plot here is not clever, the twists defy logic, and both the protagonist's insights and sexual exploits are annoyingly repetitive. The sex and food and wine that have always marked Harrison are no longer fresh exultations of spirit, no juxtaposition of culture and animalism, but are now just disturbing, flimsy, incredible and gratuitous. Any editor could cut out half of the book and improve it, and more than just scissors would be very helpful. New readers of Harrison go read his earlier work please. I will judge him by that, not this.
November 18, 2015
Ick, yuck, need ear bleach. I pulled the audio plug when the geezer had sex with his teenage daughter (adopted, but still). Pervy McPerv.
April 5, 2017
Audiobook, reader okay. Rating more like 1.5 stars. Harrison may have been a respected writer in his prime but this was a buffoonish mix of old man fantasies and preposterous unbelievable events. Many of his habits and actions evince mindless indulgences of instinct which are forgivable on occasion but sad as an every day mindset. And nope, swapping bottles of wine for whiskey does not make you less of a drunk.
His bouts of remorse seemed false and sure didn't stop him from repeating the same behavior. No wonder his wife divorced him, the fantasy part is she thinks about coming back though wisely not remarrying. In my humble opinion his eighth sin, violence, falls easily within the parameters of wrath and hubris.
This was like a bodice ripper romance (I'm no fan of those either) for old men.
His bouts of remorse seemed false and sure didn't stop him from repeating the same behavior. No wonder his wife divorced him, the fantasy part is she thinks about coming back though wisely not remarrying. In my humble opinion his eighth sin, violence, falls easily within the parameters of wrath and hubris.
This was like a bodice ripper romance (I'm no fan of those either) for old men.
June 26, 2020
The main character in this book is a retired detective, and throughout the book he is studying his life and pondering the 7 deadly sins, to which he wants to add another. The author is graphic and coarse and elegant in how he portrays what life is about. Lots of literary references and quotes, a smattering of philosophizing about religion and God. The author brought up a forgotten favorite writer of mine: Djuna Barnes. In 1977, I had a little obsession with her writing. Fun to come across this after all those years. This book I would describe as real and gritty.
March 20, 2015
Jim Harrison: making people upset that their repeated family vacations to Michigan didn't include trips to the UP since the 00s (when aforementioned people first read Jim Harrison).
You have to love a character who feels like he's really turned a corner in life when he stops drinking liquor and limits himself to multiple bottles of wine.
You have to love a character who feels like he's really turned a corner in life when he stops drinking liquor and limits himself to multiple bottles of wine.
April 13, 2020
https://rogueliterarysociety.com/f/th...
...Isolated people can become like the babbling prospectors in old Western movies…
Given the Coronavirus of late tormenting our country and the entire world, it is good to remember to make a phone call once in a while, or stop a safe distance from a neighbor and have a short chat. Too much time inside your own head is never a good thing. Better to check your ideas out with others even if they are woefully incapable of understanding even one word you say.
...He still believed in the Resurrection but figured that was because he never got around to not believing in it…
People believe what they believe and sometimes never question why. My problem has always been the questions never end. When all is said and done I rarely believe anything. Not sure what Sunderson believes in except for his obsession with female genitalia.
...Sex is the first bite of something good when you are starving…
It is never more than a page or two before Sunderson is involved with something sexual either in his mind or right in front of him. It is doubtful any moral thought goes into these acts until he has been spent. Women are sexual objects for him that he enjoys immensely. Not sure feminists would admit to “loving” the writings of Jim Harrison. Even his nonfiction is riddled with sexual innuendo and the questions he ponders over why he is the way he is. I am of the opinion that this is a good thing in the long run.
...When Sunderson served chicken pink in the joints once too often Diane had quoted St. Augustine, saying, “The reward of patience is patience.”
Always there is a kernel of truth scattered among the ashes and blood routinely found in a Jim Harrison work of fiction. I don’t believe I have ever read another writer so obsessed with the seven deadly sins. Growing up in a Lutheran household myself, and attending school in a severely rightwing political environment, hazards my own continual assessment for what I was being taught and what is expected of me. No wonder I felt I never fit in.
...When he got to the cabin it felt empty without Monica and he had an attack of melancholy. He felt doomed that it was either one female or another that dominated his interest…
The curse of being any main character in any Jim Harrison work is the need for obsessing over either one female or another. Even his nonfiction is peppered with the female anatomy. Harrison may have been cursed with this sexual obsession, but he never apologizes. In fact, though not the entre it is always part of his main menu.
...Death exhausts the options for an old fool…
Obviously the aging process affected Harrison as this and later works seemed to laser focus on the existing or coming pitfalls that began to manifest exponentially in his sixties. Difficult to ignore what eventually ails us. And then having a mind at times just as juvenile as a teenager’s also confuses the issue, especially in an aging, well-worn vessel.
...He was curious at what age his attraction to the female would disappear. It had to happen…
Based on my reading of the Jim Harrison oeuvre I do not believe his ”attraction to the female” ever disappeared. But that is what endears the bulk of his readers to him. Harrison often wrote in fictional voices the thoughts of many men’s thinking, and on the page expressing what these same men were themselves wishing they could say. Not so politically correct, nor even admirable today, but honest to the core.
...It was a live toucan with a huge beak, a beak that could crush a Brazil nut. Kids grew up calling these nuts “nigger toes” up north when he was a boy, where there are still next to no blacks except on the university sports teams in Marquette…
Having grown up in northern Michigan myself I recently mentioned this disgusting phrase regarding Brazil nuts to my wife who had grown up in Kentucky. She never heard this phrase mouthed in the South. But up north everybody called these nuts by this name for the simple reason they were taught to us by elders and peers. I naively never understood why the nuts had this name, and did not equate the phrase to African Americans until much later, but eventually I learned the correct name for these nuts and did my best to educate others. Ignorance generally reigns supreme and runs rampant until education and good sense prevails. Another reason to always question authority and never take things for granted, or even on faith.
...What was more holy than a river though man had butchered them everywhere with dams and sewage, including the worst kind, chemical sewage? To Sunderson it was worse than shitting on the altar of a church…
Trout fishermen universally hate dams. Kayakers do too. I hate chemically-fed grass whose runoff ruins our drinking water and kills plants and animals that depend on water just as we do. The ignorance and arrogance of greedy capitalists and politicians have ruined the best of what the world has to offer in its natural state. And their loyal and stupid subjects follow these same leaders as steers heading for slaughter. Jim Harrison continued up until the moment of his death to point out injustice and ignorance. And there was no box big enough to keep him in. Always a free spirit, Harrison was one of our greatest personalities and he avoided the spotlight and stage as much as possible, letting his writing speak for itself. The Big Seven is another interesting tale, composed near the end of Harrison’s life. Bits of existential crumbs are scattered throughout the book and offered as sustenance for those willing to try a bite of the old man’s wisdom. Jim Harrison is an American treasure and his body of work will most certainly stand the test of time.
...Isolated people can become like the babbling prospectors in old Western movies…
Given the Coronavirus of late tormenting our country and the entire world, it is good to remember to make a phone call once in a while, or stop a safe distance from a neighbor and have a short chat. Too much time inside your own head is never a good thing. Better to check your ideas out with others even if they are woefully incapable of understanding even one word you say.
...He still believed in the Resurrection but figured that was because he never got around to not believing in it…
People believe what they believe and sometimes never question why. My problem has always been the questions never end. When all is said and done I rarely believe anything. Not sure what Sunderson believes in except for his obsession with female genitalia.
...Sex is the first bite of something good when you are starving…
It is never more than a page or two before Sunderson is involved with something sexual either in his mind or right in front of him. It is doubtful any moral thought goes into these acts until he has been spent. Women are sexual objects for him that he enjoys immensely. Not sure feminists would admit to “loving” the writings of Jim Harrison. Even his nonfiction is riddled with sexual innuendo and the questions he ponders over why he is the way he is. I am of the opinion that this is a good thing in the long run.
...When Sunderson served chicken pink in the joints once too often Diane had quoted St. Augustine, saying, “The reward of patience is patience.”
Always there is a kernel of truth scattered among the ashes and blood routinely found in a Jim Harrison work of fiction. I don’t believe I have ever read another writer so obsessed with the seven deadly sins. Growing up in a Lutheran household myself, and attending school in a severely rightwing political environment, hazards my own continual assessment for what I was being taught and what is expected of me. No wonder I felt I never fit in.
...When he got to the cabin it felt empty without Monica and he had an attack of melancholy. He felt doomed that it was either one female or another that dominated his interest…
The curse of being any main character in any Jim Harrison work is the need for obsessing over either one female or another. Even his nonfiction is peppered with the female anatomy. Harrison may have been cursed with this sexual obsession, but he never apologizes. In fact, though not the entre it is always part of his main menu.
...Death exhausts the options for an old fool…
Obviously the aging process affected Harrison as this and later works seemed to laser focus on the existing or coming pitfalls that began to manifest exponentially in his sixties. Difficult to ignore what eventually ails us. And then having a mind at times just as juvenile as a teenager’s also confuses the issue, especially in an aging, well-worn vessel.
...He was curious at what age his attraction to the female would disappear. It had to happen…
Based on my reading of the Jim Harrison oeuvre I do not believe his ”attraction to the female” ever disappeared. But that is what endears the bulk of his readers to him. Harrison often wrote in fictional voices the thoughts of many men’s thinking, and on the page expressing what these same men were themselves wishing they could say. Not so politically correct, nor even admirable today, but honest to the core.
...It was a live toucan with a huge beak, a beak that could crush a Brazil nut. Kids grew up calling these nuts “nigger toes” up north when he was a boy, where there are still next to no blacks except on the university sports teams in Marquette…
Having grown up in northern Michigan myself I recently mentioned this disgusting phrase regarding Brazil nuts to my wife who had grown up in Kentucky. She never heard this phrase mouthed in the South. But up north everybody called these nuts by this name for the simple reason they were taught to us by elders and peers. I naively never understood why the nuts had this name, and did not equate the phrase to African Americans until much later, but eventually I learned the correct name for these nuts and did my best to educate others. Ignorance generally reigns supreme and runs rampant until education and good sense prevails. Another reason to always question authority and never take things for granted, or even on faith.
...What was more holy than a river though man had butchered them everywhere with dams and sewage, including the worst kind, chemical sewage? To Sunderson it was worse than shitting on the altar of a church…
Trout fishermen universally hate dams. Kayakers do too. I hate chemically-fed grass whose runoff ruins our drinking water and kills plants and animals that depend on water just as we do. The ignorance and arrogance of greedy capitalists and politicians have ruined the best of what the world has to offer in its natural state. And their loyal and stupid subjects follow these same leaders as steers heading for slaughter. Jim Harrison continued up until the moment of his death to point out injustice and ignorance. And there was no box big enough to keep him in. Always a free spirit, Harrison was one of our greatest personalities and he avoided the spotlight and stage as much as possible, letting his writing speak for itself. The Big Seven is another interesting tale, composed near the end of Harrison’s life. Bits of existential crumbs are scattered throughout the book and offered as sustenance for those willing to try a bite of the old man’s wisdom. Jim Harrison is an American treasure and his body of work will most certainly stand the test of time.
January 27, 2015
(This review first appeared at scrivenerscreed.com)
We revisit Sunderson from Harrison’s recent The Great Leader in The Big Seven when he buys a fishing cabin in a remote stretch of Upper Peninsula Michigan which borders the effectively sovereign territory of a notorious and violent family, the Ameses. Despite their known history of violence, incestual rape, and general brigandry, they avoid containment by an intimidated and sparse police department. Sunderson spends time reflecting on his career as a detective and his reading of history in a bid to understand the sordid underbelly of humanity, granting the novel its namesake, his desire to elucidate and augment the seven “deadly” sins.
Sunderson’s “head and shoulders were overlarge and his legs a little short...the build of a tugboat.” In The Great Leader, Sunderson claims Robert Duvall as his doppelganger, resulting in an intimidating, rough look which doesn’t suit his typically genial disposition. Although he’s a thoughtful man most at home in his waders within the rivers, he’s persistently juggling either one or another relationship with girls nearly Lolita-category pubescence.
A sort of prodigal son in negative, Lemuel Ames returns to the three-house family country after expending his youth in prison for the comparatively nonviolent crime of bank robbery. Surprised by his well-spoken manner, Sunderson takes an interest in Lemuel, although he’s often annoyed at Lemuel shoveling his sophomoric manuscripts of crime fiction in search of feedback.
Shortly after Sunderson buys the cabin, the Ameses start dying of cyanide poisoning, and Sunderson is forced to read Lemuel’s embittered fragments as more of a family confessional of violence and a personal record of vengeance than a work of fiction. Sunderson finds himself sorely unresolved during his attempts at mastering the deadly sins. He can’t help but sympathize with Lemuel, and he can’t fathom how brutalities like the Indian massacres could occur in the sublime landscapes surrounding him. At pains in writing about the seven sins, Sunderson recognizes that for the thousands of self-identified writers who spend their lifetime at the craft, so few are actually endowed with the capability to write well.
For writers seasoned and saltless, Harrison provides plenty of small tonics, from Sunderson’s comic renderings of colorless and affected university readings, to what true writing requires of a person’s life, and even perhaps a satiric riposte to the generally consistent comparisons between Hemingway and Harrison (see page 123). After shocking scenes of violence and frequent lascivious excursions, writing seems to be the next preoccupation in The Big Seven.
A poem kept by Sam of Harrison’s “Sunset Unlimited” of his novella collection, Woman Lit by Fireflies. It was given to Sam by a fellow soldier during the war in Vietnam which he keeps in his wallet, which goes:
There is no God but Reality
To seek Him elsewhere
Is the action of the fall.
Sam is of a very similar disposition as Sunderson, and the poem above strikes one as a fragment by which both men may live. One can almost imagine, if Sunderson left for Vietnam, he too may have returned to become very much like Sam: a man living in solitude, away from the world, researching his coyote kin.
While perhaps not subjected to as lurid horrors as his headbirth-mate, Sam, who was sent home from Nam after trying to duct-tape a fragmented child back together, Sunderson also sifted the darker waters of human experience. In one case of recalling to a case of domestic violence, he enters the home to find a woman who’s head appears as a half-pulped beet.
Ribaldry isn’t the only parallel between Lolita and Harrison’s latest. In Martin Amis’ introduction to Lolita, he has this to say of Humbert Humbert: “He is of a dangerous...and rare breed...such people, because they cannot make art out of life, make their lives into art. Humbert is the artist manqué.” It’s not for this reason alone that some hesitant readers find themselves sympathetic toward H.H., and it's for the same reason one suspects both Sunderson and Harrison have sympathies for Lemuel, murderer though he may be.
There’s an in-between space that all writers traverse in their work between fiction and reality. It’s the unmapped region where life is breathed in and sucked out. Here, the anarchic desire to not only paint life, but to reverse the flow of the river and transform life, is found. Some who go there, like Lemuel Ames and H.H. come out as monsters. Passersby still cannot help but believe that they and others like them who could not make life good at least wanted to make it beautiful.
Let’s be thankful that Harrison is not an artist manqué, and that the flip side of Sunderson’s cynical depiction of many lives spent in toil and failure at writing is a life like Harrison’s: continually renewed and a fount of good writing, of the few elect who cull the craft from the cosmos.
In a summer interview with Esquire last year, Harrison claims the adage of wisdom as the gift of old age is bullshit. It’s this attitude which informs Sam’s poem and is the guarantor of Harrison’s prodigious output: attend to reality, unvarnished. Harrison reiterates in “The Seven-Ounce Man” from Julip the notion from Sam’s poem: “...there is no God but Reality.” Just as Sunderson cannot help but wonder, so too it seems Harrison keeps this notion in mind, one which keeps his experience unmediated and unique in perpetuity.
We revisit Sunderson from Harrison’s recent The Great Leader in The Big Seven when he buys a fishing cabin in a remote stretch of Upper Peninsula Michigan which borders the effectively sovereign territory of a notorious and violent family, the Ameses. Despite their known history of violence, incestual rape, and general brigandry, they avoid containment by an intimidated and sparse police department. Sunderson spends time reflecting on his career as a detective and his reading of history in a bid to understand the sordid underbelly of humanity, granting the novel its namesake, his desire to elucidate and augment the seven “deadly” sins.
Sunderson’s “head and shoulders were overlarge and his legs a little short...the build of a tugboat.” In The Great Leader, Sunderson claims Robert Duvall as his doppelganger, resulting in an intimidating, rough look which doesn’t suit his typically genial disposition. Although he’s a thoughtful man most at home in his waders within the rivers, he’s persistently juggling either one or another relationship with girls nearly Lolita-category pubescence.
A sort of prodigal son in negative, Lemuel Ames returns to the three-house family country after expending his youth in prison for the comparatively nonviolent crime of bank robbery. Surprised by his well-spoken manner, Sunderson takes an interest in Lemuel, although he’s often annoyed at Lemuel shoveling his sophomoric manuscripts of crime fiction in search of feedback.
Shortly after Sunderson buys the cabin, the Ameses start dying of cyanide poisoning, and Sunderson is forced to read Lemuel’s embittered fragments as more of a family confessional of violence and a personal record of vengeance than a work of fiction. Sunderson finds himself sorely unresolved during his attempts at mastering the deadly sins. He can’t help but sympathize with Lemuel, and he can’t fathom how brutalities like the Indian massacres could occur in the sublime landscapes surrounding him. At pains in writing about the seven sins, Sunderson recognizes that for the thousands of self-identified writers who spend their lifetime at the craft, so few are actually endowed with the capability to write well.
For writers seasoned and saltless, Harrison provides plenty of small tonics, from Sunderson’s comic renderings of colorless and affected university readings, to what true writing requires of a person’s life, and even perhaps a satiric riposte to the generally consistent comparisons between Hemingway and Harrison (see page 123). After shocking scenes of violence and frequent lascivious excursions, writing seems to be the next preoccupation in The Big Seven.
A poem kept by Sam of Harrison’s “Sunset Unlimited” of his novella collection, Woman Lit by Fireflies. It was given to Sam by a fellow soldier during the war in Vietnam which he keeps in his wallet, which goes:
There is no God but Reality
To seek Him elsewhere
Is the action of the fall.
Sam is of a very similar disposition as Sunderson, and the poem above strikes one as a fragment by which both men may live. One can almost imagine, if Sunderson left for Vietnam, he too may have returned to become very much like Sam: a man living in solitude, away from the world, researching his coyote kin.
While perhaps not subjected to as lurid horrors as his headbirth-mate, Sam, who was sent home from Nam after trying to duct-tape a fragmented child back together, Sunderson also sifted the darker waters of human experience. In one case of recalling to a case of domestic violence, he enters the home to find a woman who’s head appears as a half-pulped beet.
Ribaldry isn’t the only parallel between Lolita and Harrison’s latest. In Martin Amis’ introduction to Lolita, he has this to say of Humbert Humbert: “He is of a dangerous...and rare breed...such people, because they cannot make art out of life, make their lives into art. Humbert is the artist manqué.” It’s not for this reason alone that some hesitant readers find themselves sympathetic toward H.H., and it's for the same reason one suspects both Sunderson and Harrison have sympathies for Lemuel, murderer though he may be.
There’s an in-between space that all writers traverse in their work between fiction and reality. It’s the unmapped region where life is breathed in and sucked out. Here, the anarchic desire to not only paint life, but to reverse the flow of the river and transform life, is found. Some who go there, like Lemuel Ames and H.H. come out as monsters. Passersby still cannot help but believe that they and others like them who could not make life good at least wanted to make it beautiful.
Let’s be thankful that Harrison is not an artist manqué, and that the flip side of Sunderson’s cynical depiction of many lives spent in toil and failure at writing is a life like Harrison’s: continually renewed and a fount of good writing, of the few elect who cull the craft from the cosmos.
In a summer interview with Esquire last year, Harrison claims the adage of wisdom as the gift of old age is bullshit. It’s this attitude which informs Sam’s poem and is the guarantor of Harrison’s prodigious output: attend to reality, unvarnished. Harrison reiterates in “The Seven-Ounce Man” from Julip the notion from Sam’s poem: “...there is no God but Reality.” Just as Sunderson cannot help but wonder, so too it seems Harrison keeps this notion in mind, one which keeps his experience unmediated and unique in perpetuity.
March 21, 2024
I wish there were 5 more Sunderson books - I loved The Big Seven even more than The Great Leader. It was more sure-handed in its bagginess and digressiveness and more enjoyable in its less cohesive construction. TBS was like Brown Dog lite but not less
Harrison was a true American original and one of my favorite authors this country has produced
Harrison was a true American original and one of my favorite authors this country has produced
January 12, 2015
I decided it was time to read a book by Michigan native Jim Harrison. NetGalley offered his newest novel, The Big Seven, set in the Newberry/Seney/Marqutte area of the UP. The novel's narrator first appeared in Harrison's novel The Great Leader.
The book refers to many Michigan places we have seen on trips Up North: Seney, Newberry, Marquette, Grand Marias.
Told in the first person narrative, we get to know the main character quite well--things I did not really want to know, too. Sunderson retired early from the Michigan State police where he was a detective. He drinks. He is obsessed with female posteriors. And he brought his work home, which contributed to the demise of his 40 year marriage to his ex, Diane, who he still loves.
In The Big Seven we learn about Sunderson's life long obsession with The Seven Deadly Sins, those which can condemn one to hell. He was a kid when he heard a sermon about them, and it has haunted him ever since. He constantly weighs his life, and other's, in terms of The Big Seven. He is sure there is a missing one: violence.
Sunderson and Diane had 'adopted' a neighbor's girl, Mona. Diane contact him because Mona is in trouble, dropping out of college to be a groupie. He tries to scare Mona's beau via blackmail. It didn't work, but he ends up with $10,000. He buys a remote cabin where he can indulge his love of trout fishing.
The cabin is situated in the midst of the Ames family--gun-totting, abusive, incestuous psychopaths. Sunderson intends to steer clear of them, but the Ames housekeeper/cook who comes with the cabin is found dead. Her replacement, another Ames family member named Monica, is a great cook who wants to escape her life. He is also befriended by her uncle, ex-com Lemuel Ames, a wannabe writer of crime fiction whose manuscript reads like a confession of murder. Sunderson finds himself deeply involved.
Meantime, Sunderson is trying to write a book about the eighth deadly sin--violence.
I didn't enjoy being in Sunderson's head. His thoughts jump all over the place. He constantly commits several deadly sins, including lechery and gluttony. He is a man who just 'can't say no' when young women throw themselves at him. Plus there is the older neighbor who has set out to catch any many she can. Sunderson is upset by abuse of women and children, is well read, and basically not a horrible person. But reading his wandering thoughts and inner secrets can be in turns repulsive and dull. And yet...we see into a man who is honestly struggling with his own nature. There is also a black humor about things that happen. I realize that Harrison choose to write this book from Sunderson's viewpoint for a reason. The satisfying ending with Sunderson and Diane finding a compromise relationship is quite sweet. One wonders what Sunderson will be thinking about in a third novel.
In a Lansing State Journal interview Harrison said that his publisher was "upset about his next novel--'because it's about evil.'"
http://lansingonlinenews.com/news/msu...
It has been several days since I finished The Big Seven. I don't know if I will read another Harrison novel any time soon. But I won't soon forget it.
I received a free ebook in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.
The book refers to many Michigan places we have seen on trips Up North: Seney, Newberry, Marquette, Grand Marias.
Told in the first person narrative, we get to know the main character quite well--things I did not really want to know, too. Sunderson retired early from the Michigan State police where he was a detective. He drinks. He is obsessed with female posteriors. And he brought his work home, which contributed to the demise of his 40 year marriage to his ex, Diane, who he still loves.
In The Big Seven we learn about Sunderson's life long obsession with The Seven Deadly Sins, those which can condemn one to hell. He was a kid when he heard a sermon about them, and it has haunted him ever since. He constantly weighs his life, and other's, in terms of The Big Seven. He is sure there is a missing one: violence.
Sunderson and Diane had 'adopted' a neighbor's girl, Mona. Diane contact him because Mona is in trouble, dropping out of college to be a groupie. He tries to scare Mona's beau via blackmail. It didn't work, but he ends up with $10,000. He buys a remote cabin where he can indulge his love of trout fishing.
The cabin is situated in the midst of the Ames family--gun-totting, abusive, incestuous psychopaths. Sunderson intends to steer clear of them, but the Ames housekeeper/cook who comes with the cabin is found dead. Her replacement, another Ames family member named Monica, is a great cook who wants to escape her life. He is also befriended by her uncle, ex-com Lemuel Ames, a wannabe writer of crime fiction whose manuscript reads like a confession of murder. Sunderson finds himself deeply involved.
Meantime, Sunderson is trying to write a book about the eighth deadly sin--violence.
I didn't enjoy being in Sunderson's head. His thoughts jump all over the place. He constantly commits several deadly sins, including lechery and gluttony. He is a man who just 'can't say no' when young women throw themselves at him. Plus there is the older neighbor who has set out to catch any many she can. Sunderson is upset by abuse of women and children, is well read, and basically not a horrible person. But reading his wandering thoughts and inner secrets can be in turns repulsive and dull. And yet...we see into a man who is honestly struggling with his own nature. There is also a black humor about things that happen. I realize that Harrison choose to write this book from Sunderson's viewpoint for a reason. The satisfying ending with Sunderson and Diane finding a compromise relationship is quite sweet. One wonders what Sunderson will be thinking about in a third novel.
In a Lansing State Journal interview Harrison said that his publisher was "upset about his next novel--'because it's about evil.'"
http://lansingonlinenews.com/news/msu...
It has been several days since I finished The Big Seven. I don't know if I will read another Harrison novel any time soon. But I won't soon forget it.
I received a free ebook in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.
February 4, 2015
Retired Michigan State Police detective Sunderson has come upon some fast cash and buys what he thinks will be his ideal fishing cabin in the woods of the Upper Peninsula. Rather than peace and trout, he stumbles into a profoundly dysfunctional and murderous family and all of their shenanigans. Nothing good happens.
Sunderson also struggles with the human condition, his project to add an eighth deadly sin to the seven referenced in the title, his drinking, ill-advised sexual activities, and a bunch of other stuff. You'll have to read it to find out more.
I enjoy Harrison and have for a long time. Others might shake their head at the sometimes sex-act-per-page pace of the 66 year old protagonist and his unrelenting drinking, but there is a real character under there. You might find him worth considering.
Sunderson also struggles with the human condition, his project to add an eighth deadly sin to the seven referenced in the title, his drinking, ill-advised sexual activities, and a bunch of other stuff. You'll have to read it to find out more.
I enjoy Harrison and have for a long time. Others might shake their head at the sometimes sex-act-per-page pace of the 66 year old protagonist and his unrelenting drinking, but there is a real character under there. You might find him worth considering.
March 15, 2015
Harrison returns with retired detective Simon Sunderson and a new cast of evil characters in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. Harrison uses the mystery genre to work through his own mystery (as Sunderson) to write violence into the Seven Deadly Sins. It's hard to read The Big Seven without seeing the curmudgeonly Harrison in the title role.
January 29, 2015
Better than The Great Leader, and clearly set up for another Sunderson story as he'll go after the Univ. of Michigan students wrapped up in the cult.
September 14, 2018
Sex, sex, sex and OH! a mystery amid it all. Not my genre...thank God! Unrecommended.
March 19, 2015
Jim Harrison is my favorite novelist, probably of all time; I’ve read many of his books multiple times and would happily read most of them again. He has a unique style, marvelous powers of observation; he tells a great story and is the least politically correct writer I know of. Even the rough edges to his style have a certain charm (I’m told he will allow no changes to his work, even when—as he sometimes is—he’s grammatically incorrect), and at its best his prose sings. Though some of his books involve elaborate plots, they are all, somehow, a celebration of everyday life. He’s the one writer whose work I always buy as soon as it comes out, poetry or prose, narrative or essay, and to a new reader I’d say, start with Dalva, move on to The Road Home, and continue from there as you want. You can’t go wrong.
But something has happened in his most recent work. The obsession with food and alcohol has taken over to the point where I wonder if he’s indulging while he writes. The obsession with sex has entered the realm of fantasy; our late-sixties narrator in this novel is sleeping with a 19 year old woman. The rough-hewn narratives have become no real story at all. The occasional clunkers have become the only sentences he writes. His self-indulgence has become a parody of itself.
I don’t believe I’m saying this, but I didn’t finish this book. I couldn’t. I love the man’s work too much. It was too painful.
As exhibit A I’m going to quote a long single paragraph from the first third of the book, right around the place where I gave up. I suppose I should issue a spoiler alert, but the plot details are so incidental that they hardly matter, and I don’t think you should read the book anyway.
‘He fished farther downstream than ever before, well into the Ames property. The water wasn’t as fine as his own, being too straight and monochromatic to be good trout habitat, though he caught a couple of good browns in deep pools. The ancient ancestor of the owner he’d bought from had picked the best water but then he was first by five decades. Sunderson was just getting out of the water to walk back home when something unbelievable caught his eye. Lodged in a small jam faceup was the body of one of Bert’s twins, a big vigorous boy in his teens, so freshly drowned that he looked like he could still be alive. Sunderson did a quick furtive examination rolling the boy over because his eyes were open. As a longtime detective Sunderson knew it was his responsibility to report the death but he wasn’t up to it. Suddenly he was cold and walked the two miles home shivering ignoring a playful rifle shot that hit near his feet. When he got home Monica was there with a batch of good chili. He was paying extra for meals but loved the lack of bother. When tired from fishing you didn’t want to spend an hour at the stove. He didn’t want to but told Monica about the body of her younger brother. She winced but didn’t seem to care. “Half brother. He was a horrible person. Dad made him that way,” she said, “and that crazy woman he took up with after Mom. I’ll tell the others.” Sunderson gave her exact directions and let her use his phone. He was relieved to have it in another’s hands but nonetheless feeling a little shabby as an ex-police officer. He hadn’t seen any marks on the body but if it was poison again there wouldn’t be external marks. He jumped the gun on dinner and had a small bowl of chili, then made love to Monica who was already on the bed. It seemed as ordinary as going to the grocery store though she held him more strongly than usual. The question was how do you make love to a girl after you announce you have found her brother dead in a river? But after she slipped off her jeans and sweater would it have been more hurtful to refuse. He walked a couple of miles with her on the way home. A rifle bullet hit a tree they passed. She said, “That’s Teddy. He doesn’t understand his brother is dead. They were nearly inseparable.’
That’s a sample paragraph, probably one of the worst, though far from the only bad one. To start off: that’s all one paragraph? You catch two trout, discover a corpse, examine it, get shot at (somehow he knew the shot was “playful,” though it “hit near his feet”), tell your girlfriend her brother has died, eat dinner, make love, walk a couple of miles, get shot at again, all in one paragraph? You don’t elaborate on any of it?
Sunderson doesn’t report the corpse? Somebody shoots at him and he pays no attention? Monica shrugs off the fact that her half-brother is dead? After “telling the others” (who?) and watching her boyfriend eat his dinner, she lies down on the bed, slips off her jeans and sweater (when?) to make love? Sunderson and Monica don’t seem to say anything—there’s not a lot of communication going on here—but walk several miles and don’t even shrug when a bullet hits a nearby tree? Teddy “doesn’t understand his brother is dead”? What does that mean? Does it follow that he would shoot at them? Or is he still being playful?
This is lazy writing; it is writing that is going through the motions; it is writing that goes over the same old things but has no interest in them. It’s the writing of a man who is afraid to stop writing, who has nothing better to do. It is definitely the work of a man who has no business writing a mystery. I don’t think he’s actually read many (in an essay, he admits to having little patience for “light lit”). In a mystery novel, when somebody shoots at you, you do something about it.
I still believe Jim Harrison—who is edging up on eighty years old—could write a good novel. I believe he could write a great novel. But he needs to stop writing because he’s got nothing better to do. He needs to stop writing period, take a deep breath, and see what he wants to do with the time he has left. I can’t believe it’s another faux mystery.
I’m the man’s greatest fan. I found this book heartbreaking.
But something has happened in his most recent work. The obsession with food and alcohol has taken over to the point where I wonder if he’s indulging while he writes. The obsession with sex has entered the realm of fantasy; our late-sixties narrator in this novel is sleeping with a 19 year old woman. The rough-hewn narratives have become no real story at all. The occasional clunkers have become the only sentences he writes. His self-indulgence has become a parody of itself.
I don’t believe I’m saying this, but I didn’t finish this book. I couldn’t. I love the man’s work too much. It was too painful.
As exhibit A I’m going to quote a long single paragraph from the first third of the book, right around the place where I gave up. I suppose I should issue a spoiler alert, but the plot details are so incidental that they hardly matter, and I don’t think you should read the book anyway.
‘He fished farther downstream than ever before, well into the Ames property. The water wasn’t as fine as his own, being too straight and monochromatic to be good trout habitat, though he caught a couple of good browns in deep pools. The ancient ancestor of the owner he’d bought from had picked the best water but then he was first by five decades. Sunderson was just getting out of the water to walk back home when something unbelievable caught his eye. Lodged in a small jam faceup was the body of one of Bert’s twins, a big vigorous boy in his teens, so freshly drowned that he looked like he could still be alive. Sunderson did a quick furtive examination rolling the boy over because his eyes were open. As a longtime detective Sunderson knew it was his responsibility to report the death but he wasn’t up to it. Suddenly he was cold and walked the two miles home shivering ignoring a playful rifle shot that hit near his feet. When he got home Monica was there with a batch of good chili. He was paying extra for meals but loved the lack of bother. When tired from fishing you didn’t want to spend an hour at the stove. He didn’t want to but told Monica about the body of her younger brother. She winced but didn’t seem to care. “Half brother. He was a horrible person. Dad made him that way,” she said, “and that crazy woman he took up with after Mom. I’ll tell the others.” Sunderson gave her exact directions and let her use his phone. He was relieved to have it in another’s hands but nonetheless feeling a little shabby as an ex-police officer. He hadn’t seen any marks on the body but if it was poison again there wouldn’t be external marks. He jumped the gun on dinner and had a small bowl of chili, then made love to Monica who was already on the bed. It seemed as ordinary as going to the grocery store though she held him more strongly than usual. The question was how do you make love to a girl after you announce you have found her brother dead in a river? But after she slipped off her jeans and sweater would it have been more hurtful to refuse. He walked a couple of miles with her on the way home. A rifle bullet hit a tree they passed. She said, “That’s Teddy. He doesn’t understand his brother is dead. They were nearly inseparable.’
That’s a sample paragraph, probably one of the worst, though far from the only bad one. To start off: that’s all one paragraph? You catch two trout, discover a corpse, examine it, get shot at (somehow he knew the shot was “playful,” though it “hit near his feet”), tell your girlfriend her brother has died, eat dinner, make love, walk a couple of miles, get shot at again, all in one paragraph? You don’t elaborate on any of it?
Sunderson doesn’t report the corpse? Somebody shoots at him and he pays no attention? Monica shrugs off the fact that her half-brother is dead? After “telling the others” (who?) and watching her boyfriend eat his dinner, she lies down on the bed, slips off her jeans and sweater (when?) to make love? Sunderson and Monica don’t seem to say anything—there’s not a lot of communication going on here—but walk several miles and don’t even shrug when a bullet hits a nearby tree? Teddy “doesn’t understand his brother is dead”? What does that mean? Does it follow that he would shoot at them? Or is he still being playful?
This is lazy writing; it is writing that is going through the motions; it is writing that goes over the same old things but has no interest in them. It’s the writing of a man who is afraid to stop writing, who has nothing better to do. It is definitely the work of a man who has no business writing a mystery. I don’t think he’s actually read many (in an essay, he admits to having little patience for “light lit”). In a mystery novel, when somebody shoots at you, you do something about it.
I still believe Jim Harrison—who is edging up on eighty years old—could write a good novel. I believe he could write a great novel. But he needs to stop writing because he’s got nothing better to do. He needs to stop writing period, take a deep breath, and see what he wants to do with the time he has left. I can’t believe it’s another faux mystery.
I’m the man’s greatest fan. I found this book heartbreaking.
March 30, 2018
Okay, I give it four stars because it's Harrison, and he doesn't really know how to write badly. The crime genre thing is fun, too; I'm reading this backward, so will try "The Great Leader'' next. His last book, I believe, and not in top form, though, as has been noted.
Definitely not...P.C. The protagonist seems to have an unappetizing (and unbelievably reciprocated) attraction to (very) young girls, though why they are interested in bedding down with an alcoholic ex-cop is a bit of a mystery. The historical and literary digressions are fun, too - I blocked out some of the food stuff, since that's JH's turf, not mine - and an excursion to New York is a (fairly) amusing example of Sunderson's status as a fish out of water.
I stayed with it, though; a little like Hemingway, he's worth reading even when he's not at his peak.
Definitely not...P.C. The protagonist seems to have an unappetizing (and unbelievably reciprocated) attraction to (very) young girls, though why they are interested in bedding down with an alcoholic ex-cop is a bit of a mystery. The historical and literary digressions are fun, too - I blocked out some of the food stuff, since that's JH's turf, not mine - and an excursion to New York is a (fairly) amusing example of Sunderson's status as a fish out of water.
I stayed with it, though; a little like Hemingway, he's worth reading even when he's not at his peak.
January 16, 2021
Closer to a 2.5/5. Jim Harrison’s writing style is incredibly disjointed (and could seriously use some commas). In addition, it is extremely hard to enjoy a book where the narrator is perpetually lusting after girls who are a third of his age (including his own adopted daughter). Finally, for a book that is advertised as a detective novel, there is very little detecting done.
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August 7, 2024Sanderson dreams of a world without cars: “He was a hopeless Luddite with Quixotic dreams of a world he would never see.”
On daughter Mona’s lust for life: “She had always amazed him with the immediacy with which she lived. Compared to her he existed totally on a diet of reverie and fishing.”
On daughter Mona’s lust for life: “She had always amazed him with the immediacy with which she lived. Compared to her he existed totally on a diet of reverie and fishing.”
June 30, 2017
If you liked "The Great Leader" you'll like this. More existentialism about a man in his late 60's mulling over his history as he relates to the people now in his life.
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