Three years after losing his wife and daughter to a tragic car accident, Stan Carter abandons his life and retreats to his cabin in northern Michigan. But no sooner than he discovers life again, the real world intrudes on his seclusion, forcing him to return to human society. Thus Stan's odyssey begins. Part cosmic vision quest, part farcical return to high school social dating, Stan's story will touch anyone who's shaken his head in disgust or dismay at the modern world.
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20 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Admit it-- we're all just like Stan,
By
This review is from: Into the Desperate Country (Paperback)
Jeff Vande Zande's "Into the Desperate Country" is the perfect read for anyone in search of the always elusive "meaning of life." The novel chronicles the story of Stan, a man who walked away from his safe job on the assembly line and retreated to his cabin in the woods of northern Michigan to fish, think, and try to remember how to be happy after losing his daughter and wife in a tragic accident three years prior.
Stan, however, isn't paying the bills on his house near Detroit or his cabin and is facing foreclosure. Enter June, a collections agent who shows up on his doorstep to assess the situation but turns out to be exactly what Stan needs to help him return to reality. From here, the reader is led through an unpredictable and unique series of events as Stan tries desperately to make June a part of what he wants to be his new life. What I liked best about the book is that Stan is not the only `flawed' character we encounter. He meets others along his journey with their own sets of problems--a lonely old fisherman, a stoned convenience store worker and even June, who has her own demons with which to contend. Because we see these flaws in the other characters as well, Stan isn't made out to be pathetic or a lost cause. He's actually just like everyone else, including those that read his story. This makes him incredibly likeable and relatable and he obviously ends up being the guy you root for because you're rooting for a guy just like you. This, I think, took incredible insight by the author and speaks strongly to his character development skills, without which a story is nothing. Vande Zande also does a great job of moving the reader from scene to scene along with Stan. His transitions are clean, not clunky or jarring, even though, at times, things seem to happen in a flash. A prime example is how the author takes Stan from hitching a ride with the aforementioned stoned convenience store worker to hiding from the police under a porch in only a few short pages. Although quick, transitions between scenes like this are as smooth as watching a well-directed film. Also, the settings are described vividly and it's easy to lose yourself in the story, imagining you're right beside Stan as he fumbles his way through one strange situation after another. Will the lessons Stan learns help you find happiness or a sense of purpose in your own life? Has the author revealed the secret to life for which we've all been searching? This is what will ultimately keep you turning the pages until you reach the surprising end to the story of Stan.
14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Capturing the Essence of Contemporary Nihilism,
By Grady Harp (Los Angeles, CA United States) - See all my reviews (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER) (VINE VOICE) (TOP 50 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME)
This review is from: Into the Desperate Country (Paperback)
Jeff Vande Zande writes beautifully. His style is one of concentrated poetic prose that seizes on fragmentary moments of observed nature in the wild and nature in the very rough state of human vulnerability and confusion and disrepair, forming from these puzzle pieces a tale that is at once solid in structure and challenging in content. Two days in the life of an antihero occupy the pages of INTO THE DESPERATE COUNTRY, and while the pace of the book is unrelentingly brisk, the author finds time to raise questions concerning goals and lack of same, approach/avoidance conflicts of relationships, the isolation of contemporary man longing for life to make sense, the panic of coping with society's expectations instead of following personal dreams, death, and many other breathless issues. It is a book that entertains as fast as a flash on the river of life and yet pushes the envelope of reader participation just when it seems that 'thinking' is least needed.
Stan is a scruffy lonely man whose life seems to be careening out of order: for the three years since the odd automobile accident that killed his wife and young daughter he has left the automotive line work in Detroit and has been living in a cabin in Northern Michigan without amenities, with only the ghosts of the past accompanying him on his search for a rational explanation for living. Into this wild comes June, a finance banker who has come to deliver news that Stan must make some decisions before he loses all his belongings. Attracted to the beautiful June, Stan shudders then jumps into the river flowing by his cabin, leaving the challenging June on the bank. Stan floats down the river only to face night and the natural elements, and in seeking shelter he encounters another cabin owned by a similarly disconsolate Dale who befriends him, clothes and feeds him, hears of Stan's attraction to the first female in three years, and encourages him to go for his chance to change his life by seeking out June. Stan's frantic, and in many ways humorous, search for June includes meeting other characters as out of focus as Stan until Stan finds June and a bizarre 'courtship dance' lasting two days has a tragic ending: everything Stan has been seeking to escape returns under another guise to confront his fear of the ordinary (job, wife, pay bills, boredom) when June's wealthy family attempts to suck him in. Stan again flees only to find the pieces of his recent life that made sense are now unavailable. The story is deceptively simple: the impact is very strong. This reader would have liked for the writing to continue as a longer novel, but then giving more information may have impaired the crisis and dénouement intended. Jeff Vande Zande is a creative writer of the first rank, an artist who is unafraid to infuse philosophy into his characters' lives in a way that allows the reader to both enjoy a good story while being challenged to address the contemporary individual's place in the universe. Grady Harp, June 07
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
The Tao of Fish,
This review is from: Into the Desperate Country (Paperback)
INTO THE DESPERATE COUNTRY is well worth reading. An alternate title could have been, THE TAO OF FISH.
In the beginning I didn't want to read about anything dealing with the automotive industry in Michigan. Than I discovered the main character's dilemna did NOT deal with automotive as much as with himself. (so don't worry, it is NOT about the car industry). I truly wondered what direction the author was going to take his Stan:was he a mass murderere, a stalker, a tortured soul???? I was hooked! Stan's questions mirror what many of us have asked at one time or another: what is the meaning of life and what is our purpose in the scheme of things...have we wasted our time here? So much to think about... When the female character, June, was introduced, I questioned whether I actually wanted to know more about her or if she were, in the book's reality, a foil for Stan's struggle with what or who to include into his new "life start." I mean how bloody opposite (on the surface) could she be...compared to Stan's quest for nature's pristine existence where you survive with your instinct and you react and feel the sensuality of the water but yet you are not trapped in a "responsibility laden" existence. Or at least fish aren't. Ah ha...FISH...Fish lay eggs and fertilize them and off they go: swimming and eating and looking at what is reflected in the water, making minor choices and not "giving away themselves." They hatch, they live, they eat, they swim, they die. No big emotional entanglements. No search for the meaning of their own personal existence... etc. The Black River...the river of life...Stan should, have been a taoist. Maybe that is what he will discover. I prefer to think that versus he eventually stays underwater too long and drowns. :-) The author introduced so many things to think about or discuss: job levels and classism as a representation of all the crap one puts up with in this life. Interpersonal relationships. I haven't even touched on the religious discussion potential...Christianity represented by the fish etc. Taoism and the river of life etc. Bottom line, I'm very glad I read INTO THE DESPERATE COUNTRY. I liked it. Made me think; and that, as we know, is what "art" should do :-)
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