Customer Reviews

Enemy Women: A Novel (P.S.)

5 star:		(45)
4 star:		(25)
3 star:		(26)
2 star:		(10)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

Poet Paulette Jiles opens a chapter of her splendid debut novel, Enemy Women, with an eyewitness account penned in the 1860s: ".....On this same raid they went into the home of two of my uncles and took them out and hung them to their own gatepost. They were big men and were my mother's brothers. My mother was there and saw it all and as long as she lived she never got over the shock. And they called that a civil war. It was the cruelest war we ever had."

Cruel may well be a euphemism for the atrocities suffered during the American Civil War, yet there was also great courage and strength. With deft narrative skills and the story of one young woman, Ms. Jiles has created an unforgettable portrait of a nation riven by mortal strife.

In 1864, the third year of the war, Adair Colley lives with her family on a farm in the Missouri Ozarks. It is Confederate territory but the Colleys remain neutral. Adair has just turned eighteen when the Union Militia gallops onto their property, attempts to burn the house, and strikes her widowed father in the face with a wagon spoke before arresting him. To punctuate their visit the Militia "shot the dogs and took as many chickens and geese and pigs as they could catch."

John, the only Colley son, seeks shelter in nearby hills. While Adair, believing there might be safety to the north, takes her two younger sisters and begins the 120 mile trek to Iron Mountain. They join "the streams of refugees afoot as if they were white trash." Any hope of finding a haven is destroyed when one among the walkers falsely accuses Adair of collaborating with the enemy, and she is taken from her terrified sisters to a women's prison in St. Louis.

Filthy, rank, and cold, the prison is "like the Female Seminary of the netherworld. A ladies' academy in hell." Nonetheless, it is here that she meets her Union interrogator, Major William Neumann. They fall in love. When Adair refuses to sign a confession in order to obtain her freedom, Neumann helps her escape with the promise that he will find her after the war.

However, there are still countless dangers to be faced as Neumann is sent to the Alabama front lines, and Adair braves a perilous solitary trek through uncharted wilderness and enemy territory to find what might be left of her home and family.

Debilitated by her prison stay and a chronic cough which a "steam doctor" diagnoses as consumption she presses on, sometimes forced to steal for food and clothing.

Adair is the embodiment of an innocent victimized by war as well as a reminder of the tensile strength humans summon when there is an intense desire to survive.

With researcher's eye Ms. Jiles has illuminated a little known aspect of Civil War history, the incarceration of women. Her prose is artful, describing a new leaf as "already as large as a squirrel's ear, " or a man with "a pair of jaws like church pews." Painful in its authenticity, poetically rendered, Enemy Women is a book that will not be forgotten.

I wasn't going to read this novel. I'm not big on the Civil War or history or stories that take place pre-1900, but Anna Quindlen and Kaye Gibbons raved about it so I thought I'd give it a try. Thank Heavens I did. I could not get enough of this novel. Paulette Jiles pulls you right into Missouri and takes you through an exciting journey with Adair Colley. Jiles' writing is so crisp that you can feel the wind and the sunlight she writes about, you can hear the horses galloping in the woods, you will fall in love with the Missouri wilderness (and will Col. Neumann, too!) But this is more than I love story. The history of the Civil War is absolute throughout. I cannot imagine a single soul that would not find this novel to be worth the read.

Award-winning poet Paulette Jiles enthralls readers with this, her first novel, a gripping tale of love and survival among the destruction of the Civil War. In southeastern Missouri, Adair Colley and her two young sisters are left alone when the Union Militia arrests their father. Leaving their partially burnt home, the girls set out on foot to search for their father.

But Missouri is a state divided, with renegade rebels led by Colonel Tim Reeves, and the Union Militia destroying all in the name of martial law. When Adair is arrested on false charges of aiding the confederate "enemy", she is taken to a prison in St. Louis and must leave her sisters behind. Crafty and resourceful, Adair manages to survive amongst the female population of the General Ward, despite threats from other inmates and the evil-doings of the matron.

While in prison, Adair attracts the attention of Major William Neumann, who promises to request her release in return for a signed confession. As the frequency of their meetings increases, their clever banter gradually changes into a union of like souls, amidst the horrors of the war. When they must each go their different ways, time will tell if love is strong enough to withstand their separation.

Lyrical prose capturing both the beauty of the Ozarks and the destruction of human life all around forms the framework in this alluring read. The texture is further enhanced by the snippets of Civil War history interspersed with fictional elements. And the focus on a Civil War Missouri is both refreshing and educational, no antebellum homes here, mostly just poor farmers with nary a plantation in sight.

I cannot say that I loved this book--but something about it kept me reading. The writing is beautiful, although I must say, the author's decision not to use quotation marks didn't work for me with this one. Jiles is a poet, which is obvious throughout the novel. The story of Adair Colley starts of rather slowly. She is a young Missouri woman who is taken prisoner during the Civil War. While in prison, she is interrogated by Major William Neumann. Despite their differences, they fall in love. (There is no way to describe it without making it sound like some trite romance novel, is there?) They are separated and she travels the long journey home--hoping to find her father, her sisters, her horse, her home. Needless to say, it is a difficult journey. There are no surprises in this novel, but the writing is beautiful and it does vividly portray the horror of the Civil War. The story, despite its predictability is compelling.

Excellent book if you are a fan of historical books, especially if you are interested in the Missouri Ozarks during the Civil War. Since I only read this book as a member of a book club which selected it, I wasn't that fond of it, nor would I have hung in there long enough to finish the read.

The story line was difficult to get into. Her lack of quotation marks slowed down my reading. I found the use of language of those times in the Ozarks sometimes difficult to figure out the underlying meaning, felt like I was plodding through words. Since Jiles is a poet, maybe she thinks vague is good.

I was never intrigued by the main character, Adair, although she had lots of spunk. In many ways she was smart-alecky and self-centered.

The historical quotations at the beginning of each chapter confused me - I kept reading them, thinking they pertained to what was going to happen in that chapter, and be meaningful, but that seldom occurred. Mostly they showed the brutality that had been handed out to everybody, soldiers and civilians alike. The mention of what happened to those who had to have a limb amputated seemed to be the only one that fit the story of that chapter.

The Major in the Union Army who fell for her, and her for him, had very little characterization. Those who called him two-dimensional hit it on the head.

Her detailed descriptions of EVERYTHING became tiring. It seemed impossible that Adair could have found not only her own horse, but her sister's horse.

I liked her ingenuity in tricking the man who was attempting to capture her into a deer trap!

The ending was a slap in the face. We readers who lasted that long deserved more than a glance from the Major to Adair, and a look of recognition from her to him. There was no warmth, although apparently some joy to find each other again. How insulting of the author to just stop writing.

During the Civil War, the citizens of Missouri were torn by conflicting loyalties. Some citizens were joining the fight for the South, while Union military troops were garrisoned nearby, and women prisoners retained, those with suspected loyalties or Confederate family ties. Overcrowded and teeming with a varied population, the women were house and reviewed in an effort to place them in an appropriate facility. Young Adair Colley is thrown into this mix after her father is murdered and she is separated from her two younger sisters. Long without their mother, Adair has been the de facto mother of the Colley brood. From the moment of her incarceration, Adair schemes to escape and join with her sisters to salvage whatever family remnants may remain.

Adair is nothing if not spirited. When interviewed by a Union officer, it is her express intent to captivate him and manipulate her ultimate freedom from the frequently violent women's prison. But the young soldier, Neumann, detests his duty and yearns to serve a more noble effort. Against his best intentions, Neumann cannot remain impassive to Adair's plight and eventually engineers the inevitability of her escape. Out of the chaos of brother against brother, the two young people are drawn to each other, although each must pursue a separate path before the journey is completed.

Each chapter of the book is prefaced by actual Civil War journal entries, making the story more relevant in the face of day to day cruelties, as various persons are accounted for. What would otherwise be a simple love story of opposites gains more credulity by the historical reality of the journals, which illustrate clearly the confusion of the times as well as the loss of loved ones. Jiles is an engaging writer whose lively characters reflect their quirky backgrounds and eccentricities. There is a finely honed sense of the incredible chaos that upended so many lives and changed future generations of Americans.

First of all, I will not summarize the novel; it has already been done. I will simply reflect in a scattershot way. The comparison to Frazier's Cold Mountain is inevitable; however, I feel Ms. Jiles has her own voice. I also see comparison to Howard Bahr's The Black Flower. If I were to rank the three, Ms. Jiles' Enemy Women is the best with The Black Flower second. Sorry gentlemen, but Adair, the female heroine does it for me; I love her. She will honestly go down in my favorite character hall of fame. She is sarcastic, funny, childlike, naive, pensive, resourceful--all rolled into one. I agree with the previous reviewer's use of the word ephemeral but in a much more positive way. I think of the prison washlines and description of Adair's hair--always returning to her beautiful hair whether drying or floating in Hominy Creek, washing, etc. It is almost otherworldly-- beautifully and flawlessly written in my humble opinion. I also was particularly moved by the landscape--Adair riding Whiskey, returning home, etc. Perhaps it is just me, but the writing was quite sensuous.
As far as characterization, Adair is much more than a one-dimensional static character. She is a child when she sets out with her sisters seeking her father's whereabouts, but she is much more when she returns home. She both feels and acts. Neumann is not what this novel is about; it is mainly Adair's story, but also the story of all those who lost their lives, homes, livelihoods, so senselessly in the Civil War, and their journeys to find something meaningful in all that chaos. Which brings me to the chapter-introducing bits and pieces from letters, etc. I am an English teacher constantly attempting to get my students to step back in time and experience; however, even the most intelligent seem incapable of doing this. I was very moved by the James McPherson on p. 295; we should all ponder this.
In conclusion, Ms. Jiles has done the best possible job transporting the reader to the Civil War era; the language, colloquialisms, mannerisms, speech patterns, etc. I don't do the novel justice; you, dear reader, can only do that by giving Enemy Women a chance. I don't think you will regret it.

This book is based on both scrupulous research about the Civil War, as well as stories of the author's own family and neighbors which have been passed down through the generations. For its literary style and emotion impact, it's being compared to "Cold Mountain", a tremendously successful novel that also brought the realities of the Civil War to life through the experiences of a single character.

There's an authenticity about the setting which is augmented by each chapter heading which includes long excepts from actual period documents. This framework works well, as do all the little details of the period, which seemed to just pick me up and set me down right in the middle of the Ozark region in the 1860s. And some of her descriptive passages seemed like pure poetry. Instead of focusing on the big battles, it is about bloodshed and fear and tumultuous conditions for the average person during those awful times. The heroine, Adair Colley, is just 18 years old when the war starts. When Union troops burn her house and imprison her father, she takes to the road with her two younger sisters, only to be captured and sent to a federal women's prison in St. Louis. The conditions there are harsh and she suffers from fever, but refuses to make a confession that might put her brother and neighbors in danger. Somehow, though, she has a romance with the Union officer who interrogates her, helps her escape, and vows to return to her after the war.

This is where the credibility of the book broke down for me. She's just a little too pretty, has a little too much grit, and there is little, if any complexity to her character. Of course we root for the poor dear as she conquers obstacle after obstacle, always surviving in spite of horrible odds even though she is has consumption, her food supply is sparse, and she's constantly running from Union troops. The bad guys are just a little too bad, the good guys get killed or suffer, and, even though she has to steal to get by, she always comes out on top. I never did see what she saw in the Union officer she loves and even though there are several chapters devoted to his battle experience, he never really come across in any depth. The conclusion was inevitable and I knew it long before I finished the book, which soon became very boring to read. I also can't understand why the author decided not to use quotation marks and this often broke my concentration just to follow some of the dialogue.

I therefore have to give this book a mixed review. It gets a high recommendation for its setting and sense of history. But as for the characters and the situation, I have to give it a "thumbs down".

Adair Colley, the resourceful and resolute focus of Paulette Giles' engrossing "Enemy Women," faces evey horror guerilla warfare unceasingly hurls at her as she attempts to impossible task of trying to control her own destiny. Set in the chaotic, brutal and traumatic final months of the Civil War in ravaged southeast Missouri, the novel brilliantly portrays both the undaunting courage of a solitary heroic protagonist and the ghastly indifference of war and nature to the human folly of control and order. "Enemy Women" is at once a harrowing account of the consequences of fraternal warfare and an inspiring epic of a woman's quest for life. It is a deeply satisfying and compassionate portrait of the possibilities of love.

The author has compressed the enormity of social cataclysm into a narrative of loss, exile and reclamation. Adair Colley, as a headstrong, visionary eighteen-year old, resonates to the "smoke of her internal fire...every breath was a letter to the world." No sooner does her beloved father present her with a stunning horse, whose symbolic presence and absence permeate the novel, than she is forced to witness her father's degradation at the hands of a lawless, renegade band of quasi-legal federal soldiers. War making is far from glorified in "Enemy Women," although Jiles does permit Adair's brother, John Lee, to articulate warfare's lure to men. The "great, silent driving forces" which inspire John Lee provoke vicious, atavistic violence in others.

Aswirl in this rip tide of detruction, Adair loses control of her life, fails to protect her sisters from depradation and finds herself in jail, the result of false denunciation. Wrongfully imprisoned, she discovers love in the person of her interrogator. Deeply conflicted himself, Major William Neumann discovers authentic feelings for Adair. This discovery compels him to undertake his own existential journey, one which will lead him through both philosophical and physical challenges. He pays dearly for his understandings.

Written in spare, poetic and tough language, "Enemy Women" is above all a work about costs. Once Adair and William shed their naively antiquated notions of human beneficence, once they strip away their previously held and now preposterous notions that humans can control destiny, they discover the enormous toll the world takes on good people. Civilization is little more than a "thin tissue...a willed invention," little thicker than the "fabric on a sail." Jiles' naturalistic descriptive skills highlight this dark interpretation of life. Yet, Adair and William, squeezed by physical want, disease and human depravity, emerge with newly burnished selves, inspired and inspiring.

Paulette Jiles goes to great pains to establish authenticity, beginning each chapter with first-hand Civil War documentation. Judicious editing would have served her well, as the evidence becomes repetitious and excessively lengthy. This minor flaw, however, does nothing to diminish this brilliant novel. "Enemy Women" is an incredible debut novel provocative, moving and compelling, it introduces a marvelous protagonist who is everything but an enemy.

I bought this book on tape before I took a long road trip a few weeks ago. The story is one that I have never heard told before -- that of a female taken prisoner during the Civil War. I never even knew about such women, or the prisons that housed them, until this novel. It is therefore an intersting perspective on the war and its devastating effect on the county, its families and the individuals who not only fought in it, but who were left behind.

Adair Colley is a young Missouri woman comes from a family whose father, a judge, is apolitical and who hopes to keep his family protected and apart from the war. This is not to be the case, of course, and his family is torn asunder when he is beaten and taken prisoner, the family home ransacked, the barn burned and the children set out to survive as best they can. Adair is a feisty 18 year old who is taken prisoner when she is betrayed by a family of fellow travelers while she is on the road searching for her father. Her saga thus begins; she will struggle to find her way back home while battling illness, loneliness and sorrow. Her romance with the Major who is in charge of the prison (until he is transferred, at his request, to the battlefield) is abrupt but believable, considering the fact that many a wartime relationship began and developed quickly, and Adair is a winning young woman with guts and beauty. A bit like Scarlett O'Hara, but more likeable by far.

Each chapter begins with historical facts and commentary, as well as journal entries made during the time of the war. This provides a vivid backdrop to the action of the novel, as well as an historical perspective that makes it all the more realistic.

Adair's journey home parallells that of Major Neumann, her love interest. They seek each other and a future,during a time when nothing was certain and so many lives, dreams and hopes were lost. Interesting perspective, a vital and admirable female character. I have heard this book compared to Cold Mountain, but they are really not similar, except that they take place during the Civil War. Cold Mountain was a much more literary novel with more depth, well written and thought provoking. This book I would consider to be more of a popular fiction, historically accurate but without the literary depth. Entertaining nonetheless, and the perspective was fascinating.