Customer Reviews

The Dream of the White Village: A Novel in Stories

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This was an interesting book which effectively captures the lives of a set of people living in a small city in New England - simple, sometimes desperate, but real, life. It truly is a series of stories which is in some ways enjoyable; at the same time I wished I could have read more about some of the characters who the reader only briefly encounters. A few are really hilarious.

Philip Baruth has accomplished something very rare with The Dream of the White Village. He has captured the very soul of Burlington; a very human soul that is sad, funny, dark, and uplifting at various turns and sometimes all at once.

Set in Burlington, Vermont, these are stories within a story that slowly weave together as the pages are turned. It's stories of people you either know, or see in passing on the street. A cop with a dark side and his racist sons. A gay man and lesbian. A divorcee who's new in town. A lonely widow. These people and others encounter each other through days and nights, over years, sometimes even for just a moment. I personally really felt a connection with this book. I was born in Burlington.

Every other page named a bar, a park, a street or area that I know very well. It was easy to envision these people there, in many cases I knew the exact spot mentioned. Each of these types of individuals I've known in my life. Between readings these characters would cross my mind while I was in public, and I'd wonder if I'd just seen one of them...you know.

As the back of the book says, you need not live around Burlington to enjoy this novel and absorb the characters in it. This could be any town from New England to Missouri. I'd suggest this to any reader from anywhere. To any locals...I'd suggest not playing pool with a stranger named Maurice.