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Central Valley
a novel by Sarah D'Stair (author of Hand to Bone, roulettetown, and Petrov Petrovich is in Love)
146 pages, Paperback
Published January 1, 2017
1 person is currently reading
About the author
Sarah D'Stair
12 books7 followersSarah D’Stair is the author of three novels, including Helen Bonaparte, finalist for the BookLife 2024 Award, Abstract, and Central Valley, and the poetry chapbook One Year of Desire. Her poetry and short fiction have appeared in Burningword, Waxing & Waning, Inwood Indiana and other publications, and her poetry reviews and interviews have appeared in West Branch, The Adroit Journal, The Rupture, and elsewhere. She also publishes academic articles in the field of critical animal studies.
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
April 5, 2024
PORTRAIT OF THE READER AS A YOUNG GIRL
A little while ago, I came by chance over Sarah D'Stair's excellent novel "Helen Bonaparte", a romantic obsession playing out mostly within a woman's head. Since I liked this and D'Stair's style of writing a lot, I tried to find more of her work. It turns out that there are only a few poetry collections, some novellas, and a book called "Central Valley" (2017). Basically, all are out of print and hard to get. A single chapter from "Central Valley", "Canal Days", is available on-line in the magazine "Gertrude Press".
This chapter, "Canal Days", made me immediately long for the whole book. A ten-year-old girl's memory of a perfect, carefree summer day with a friend. Innocent and safe in their summer routines together. A piece of feather-light, dreamlike quality. The places mentioned are real, one can follow the girls' day with a finger on a map. This makes it easy to almost overlook a twist at the end: "She goes right, I go straight, back to our own houses. Hers cozy, mine yellow." Just a hint of something not so pleasant, darker.
Thanks to the publisher (they prepare a new edition) I have the complete book in my hands. Now I understand a few things: "This novel is about geography and the finer points on a map that runs the length of California's Central Valley." But it is not a novel in a conventional sense, with a beginning and an end and a coherent story in between. Often it is not pleasant, sometimes disturbing, even cruel. The book is a loose, unsorted collection of short pieces, giving the impression of disconnected and quite intimate memories of a "Central Valley girl bred of chaos and accident". The chapter with the same title as the book, "Central Valley", sums it up: "A stumble, and a stride. An innocence, and a crime."
"The little yellow-haired girl who has been featured so often in these tales" has been moved around between parents and to yet "another new house on another new street with another new dad in the house ... So many schools now." There are tons of research showing the impact of frequently moving during childhood. Among other things, it can inhibit the formation of durable memories. Too many places to link these memories to. This is even spelled out explicitly: "At some point the moving got to be too much. Too much separation. Too much dislocation. All experience left to memory, but the memory of a child lasts only so long." This is how this book needs to be read. Sometimes things will be vague, fragmented, almost unsure whether some of it actually happened. Sometimes just pulled up from a detail remembered of a place. A lion statue, a Monopoly game, or the headboard of a bed.
The style is concise and unemotional. What happens is shown from the point of view of a child, sparsely disrupted by reflections of the adult who tries to make sense of it. Short chapters, each in one single paragraph. When the tale becomes heavy, sentences are gradually heaped together with less and less punctuation. In the most disturbing pieces there are not even capital letters. All coming out in an increasingly urgent whisper. Too painful to say aloud or to listen to at normal speed. This is all set out in the first chapter, "The B Book": Words "fall into each other, one mangled unexpressed dusty heap on the last page." This book needs slow reading and careful listening. That way, the reader will find sudden understanding, sometimes horrified, sometimes rewarded with pieces of sheer beauty.
There are the bad memories of parental neglect, adult cruelty, child-abuse, drugs. Times of not being seen by the adults. When she is found with another girl, softness and safety turned into nightmare, the only thing she gets from her father is: "We don't do that here." She so desperately wants to be seen. But this "is a sad story. Watch out for it. It is no good." Sometimes the reader is left speechless, breathless.
There are also the good memories with family love, making up for the bad times, a beloved little brother, maybe first love. Discovering her world and keeping innocent secrets. Of moving on and growing up. Almost normal family life.
And there are books, lots of books, books everywhere. This girl reads. The books feature often in the more pleasant memories or they console her when it was not so pleasant. It shines clearly through the text that this girl is rescued by books, finding resilience, comfort, and optimism. As a reader, I love this.
If anything negative had to be said about this book, it would be that it is very short. Hopefully, we see more of Sarah D'Stair in the future!
A little while ago, I came by chance over Sarah D'Stair's excellent novel "Helen Bonaparte", a romantic obsession playing out mostly within a woman's head. Since I liked this and D'Stair's style of writing a lot, I tried to find more of her work. It turns out that there are only a few poetry collections, some novellas, and a book called "Central Valley" (2017). Basically, all are out of print and hard to get. A single chapter from "Central Valley", "Canal Days", is available on-line in the magazine "Gertrude Press".
This chapter, "Canal Days", made me immediately long for the whole book. A ten-year-old girl's memory of a perfect, carefree summer day with a friend. Innocent and safe in their summer routines together. A piece of feather-light, dreamlike quality. The places mentioned are real, one can follow the girls' day with a finger on a map. This makes it easy to almost overlook a twist at the end: "She goes right, I go straight, back to our own houses. Hers cozy, mine yellow." Just a hint of something not so pleasant, darker.
Thanks to the publisher (they prepare a new edition) I have the complete book in my hands. Now I understand a few things: "This novel is about geography and the finer points on a map that runs the length of California's Central Valley." But it is not a novel in a conventional sense, with a beginning and an end and a coherent story in between. Often it is not pleasant, sometimes disturbing, even cruel. The book is a loose, unsorted collection of short pieces, giving the impression of disconnected and quite intimate memories of a "Central Valley girl bred of chaos and accident". The chapter with the same title as the book, "Central Valley", sums it up: "A stumble, and a stride. An innocence, and a crime."
"The little yellow-haired girl who has been featured so often in these tales" has been moved around between parents and to yet "another new house on another new street with another new dad in the house ... So many schools now." There are tons of research showing the impact of frequently moving during childhood. Among other things, it can inhibit the formation of durable memories. Too many places to link these memories to. This is even spelled out explicitly: "At some point the moving got to be too much. Too much separation. Too much dislocation. All experience left to memory, but the memory of a child lasts only so long." This is how this book needs to be read. Sometimes things will be vague, fragmented, almost unsure whether some of it actually happened. Sometimes just pulled up from a detail remembered of a place. A lion statue, a Monopoly game, or the headboard of a bed.
The style is concise and unemotional. What happens is shown from the point of view of a child, sparsely disrupted by reflections of the adult who tries to make sense of it. Short chapters, each in one single paragraph. When the tale becomes heavy, sentences are gradually heaped together with less and less punctuation. In the most disturbing pieces there are not even capital letters. All coming out in an increasingly urgent whisper. Too painful to say aloud or to listen to at normal speed. This is all set out in the first chapter, "The B Book": Words "fall into each other, one mangled unexpressed dusty heap on the last page." This book needs slow reading and careful listening. That way, the reader will find sudden understanding, sometimes horrified, sometimes rewarded with pieces of sheer beauty.
There are the bad memories of parental neglect, adult cruelty, child-abuse, drugs. Times of not being seen by the adults. When she is found with another girl, softness and safety turned into nightmare, the only thing she gets from her father is: "We don't do that here." She so desperately wants to be seen. But this "is a sad story. Watch out for it. It is no good." Sometimes the reader is left speechless, breathless.
There are also the good memories with family love, making up for the bad times, a beloved little brother, maybe first love. Discovering her world and keeping innocent secrets. Of moving on and growing up. Almost normal family life.
And there are books, lots of books, books everywhere. This girl reads. The books feature often in the more pleasant memories or they console her when it was not so pleasant. It shines clearly through the text that this girl is rescued by books, finding resilience, comfort, and optimism. As a reader, I love this.
If anything negative had to be said about this book, it would be that it is very short. Hopefully, we see more of Sarah D'Stair in the future!
Displaying 1 of 1 review