Customer Reviews

Oyster: A Novel

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

First of all the setting takes you away from the hustle and bustle of modern day life. This story takes place in the bayous and swamps of Louisiana in the late 1950's - a time when Oyster farmers were threatened by the polution of modern industry. I happen to come from Louisiana and can say that the author captured this very well.

Second, Biguenet's style is lively and rhythmic. He rarely takes refuge in boring verbs like "to be" or "to have", instead using more descriptive verbs to carry his sentences.

Biguenet develops the characters like an expert psychologist, making the reader feel the struggles with guilt and family loyalties. The story unfolds very naturally and as it goes on you see how some of the characters dig themselves deeper and deeper into a hole. It's hard to put the book down once you start reading.

I have also read another work by this author, "The Torturer's Apprentice", and I note that he picks interesting settings and really gets into the details of those settings. He also does a nice job of portraying the way people deal with guilt.

I would really prefer to give this book 3½ stars - it's not as bad as the 3 star rating would indicate. Biguenet is a fine writer - his short story collection, THE TORTURER'S APPRENTICE, which was published in 2001, simply blew me away. I was anticipating reading OYSTER immensely on the strength of that earlier work. The novel, however, reads like the author has turned himself down a notch. The characters are well-developed, and the story is an interesting one - and the setting, costal Louisiana in the late 1950s, is vividly depicted. I guess it's just that he seemed to be taking more risks with his shorter fiction, and not just for the sake of appearing to be `innovative' - there was an educated, controlled abandon about those stories that was actually rather thrilling to experience as a reader. By comparison, the novel hit me more like a made-for-TV movie - albeit a well-made one. Too much of it was predictable - the characters' personalities and the conflicts they engendered, as well as several of the plot turns, could be seen coming `with the headlights on'.

I'm sure that the author will continue to work - he's got an amazing talent, just read the short story collection if you haven't, it's breathtaking. I'm hoping that this novel turns out to be a stepping-stone to something greater - I know he has it in him.

This review is for the first Ecco Paperback edition published in 2003, 291 pages. Ecco Press is an imprint of HarperCollins.

OYSTER by John Biguenet is the story of two rival families, the Bruneau's and the Petitjean's, who have the largest oyster leases in Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana. Fifty-two year old Darryl Bruneau holds loans on Felix Petitjean's home and boat. Felix is on the verge of default. To avoid losing everything, Felix agrees to give Darryl his eighteen-year old daughter, Therese.

Oops, Therese has other ideas. She tells Darryl, "I don't get bought for the price on no damn boat." In one of the most engaging first chapters I've ever read, Therese irrevocably upsets her daddy's plans. Go to the bookstore and read the first seven pages of OYSTER by John Biguenet; I'll wager that you buy the book.

With masterful dialogue and just enough sensory detail, John Biguenet captures the sounds and feel of the oysterman's plight in the fall of 1957. There are some rough passages, like Mrs. Petitjean's confession to Therese, and occasionally Biguenet goes head hopping with omniscient POV, but he never forgets that it's all about story. This is a good story told well.

`Oyster' is a great book on every level. For simple reading it's a gritty story of murder, revenge and steamy passion. It centers on a feud between the two leading families of the Plaquemines Parish, LA, oyster industry. Felix Petitjean and family represent the long established leading family of the parish while Darryl `Horse' Bruneau and his three sons are the brash, heavy-fisted newcomers who have carved a niche for themselves by buying up the leases of destitute competitors.

Horse ("This child wants to know why I'm called The Horse. Think she's old enough to see?") dies early in the story but his personality is so forceful that his spirit is felt long after his body sinks into the bayou. Even dead he manipulates the actions of the story's characters, for good or (more likely) ill.

At first I was concerned that Biguenet was steering his readers toward a Cajun `Romeo and Juliet' but he avoided falling into that trap. That would not have worked at all in this rough-and-tumble setting. In its place, the author offered a much more compelling plot, deftly enhanced by intricately woven interrelationships of love and hatred.

But Biguenet, an English professor at Loyola, didn't settle for just a simple read. Some have compared John Biguenet to William Faulkner but I don't see it. James Dickey maybe, but I never found Faulkner to be this entertaining. Nevertheless, social allegory lurks just below the surface of Bayou Petitjean, as omnipresent as the gators. Therese Petitjean is stirring up existence in Egret Pass as certainly and inexorably as the channels cut by the oil companies are changing the sedentary life of the oysters. It soon becomes very apparent that "It ain't like the old days, Darryl."

This is a must read. Rustle up some shrimp etouffee, put on the Beausoleil and make yourself very comfortable. You won't want to put this down for a long time.

John Biguenet hooked me and carried me into the salt marshes and small towns of Southern Louisiana in 1957. I felt the humidity, smelled the salt marsh, tasted the jumbalaya, heard the clattering of winches and felt the nets on my hands. The characters are memorable, the story engaging and the twists and turns of the plot kept me hooked until the very end. This page turning yarn explores issues such as justice or revenge, the impact of "economic development" on traditional lifestyles, and how actions - - sometimes from decades earlier - - can rear their heads and bite us, all without any preachiness. This is a strong novel and leaves me eager for number two.

John Biguenet's Oyster is a deeply dark and interesting novel that tells the tale of two familes immersed in a deadly rivalry in the late 1950s. The characters are well developed and the plot is engaging to the reader. Biguenet reminds one of Faulkner and I would highly recommend this novel which is hard to put down. I was sorry when I finished it.

Oyster is set in the heart of the Louisiana bayou, a tale replete with strange characters, infidelity, greed and murder. It is a world filled with violence as ominous and sudden as the bite of a crocodile.

The Petitjean's own the richest oyster beds in the parish, but they are heavily in debt to their rivals, the Bruneau's. "Horse" Bruneau and his three sons are ready to take over all the beds still producing in spite of the ongoing damage from the oil companies that are slowly polluting the waters. Planning to join the holdings of both families through a marriage of convenience, Horse Bruneau pursues Therese Petitjean. But Therese is not about to be tendered as a piece of merchandise, although she does realize that the union would benefit her family financially. Family loyalty is paramount in both clans, and blood defines every action.

Suddenly, violence erupts, two are dead and there are questions that cannot easily be answered. Local citizens are curious about the crimes, but never surprised by bizarre circumstances. Sheriff Christovitch, a man who is familiar with the histories of all the suspects and has a past of his own, attempts to ascertain exactly the who, how and why of the murders.

As twisted and mysterious as the murky bayou, the novel takes one unexpected turn after another. Some of the more colorful characters, including Horse and Horse, Junior, have natures as bent and narrow as the gnarled roots of the ancient trees that extend deep below the waterline. A challenge to man's true nature, there is no pity, or easy answer when life and death are at stake. Two wrongs never make a right. Or do they? Luan Gaines/2003.

*Oyster* by John Biguenet begins so beautifully that it's a pity how far it bogs down as the story winds on. Initially, a wonderful, exotic ambience and a shocking deed capture the reader -- but once's s/he's captured, the reader is tortured with prose that grows ever more labored and didactic. Explaining the technical aspects of fishing-boat engines in the context of crime doesn't make them more interesting. And, having one character tell another how oystermen find their beds by checking trees on the bank doesn't make that exciting, either. These kinds of details can be lively and add to a book's power, but they have to be handled wisely.
At the end, the author's need to tie up all loose ends results in nearly a grade-schooler's obviousness and dull simplicity. What a pity! Perhaps this is the result of a first attempt to move from short stories into full-novel format. Biguenet has a gift, and it shows up early in this book, but it's betrayed by the rest. I wanted to continue to feel that bayou water on my skin as I read, but instead I felt a kind of irritation of the brain.

How anyone who has read Faulkner can compare this book to his works is beyond comprehension to me. This book was average at best--certainly nothing approaching a classic. The protagonist is a cold-blooded murderer--yet this fact doesn't seem to bother anyone--least of all the author. The worst part of this novel was the amateurish gimmick of having Therese's mother tell her whole life story to her daughter over hot chocolate one night. Much easier than trying to weave those facts into an actual plot I guess. This book was a waste of my time.

I absolutely loved this book. The plot moved along at a nearly lightning pace, and characters were amazing. (Primarily Therese, who drives the action of the entire book. Dude, when two men are dead by page 50, you know you've got a page-turner.)

Here's the quick version: Set in Louisiana in the late 50s, Oyster tells the tale of two rival families: the Petitjeans and the Bruneaus. Both families harvest oysters for a living, and ecological changes are putting full-time oystermen out of business. Therese Petitjean, a young girl, is offered in marriage to Horse Bruneau, more than 30 years her senior. The match will unite the two largest surviving oyster families, ensuring continued success, as well as lift the Petitjeans out of mounting debt. When Horse turns up dead, well before the wedding, his three sons are sure that a Petitjean is to blame. One murder later, the real killer is still on the loose.

I thought Biguenet did a wonderful job of capturing the atmosphere of Louisiana and the region's love of food. As well, Therese is one of the strongest female characters I've read in a long time. Make yourself a pot of gumbo and READ THIS BOOK!