Customer Reviews

Saving Grace

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(13)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Saving Grace by Lee Smith is the tale of Grace Shepherd, a woman whose life is largely defined by two Southern primitive Christian ministers--Virgil Shepherd, her egomaniacal, sociopath philandering father and Travis Word, her pious, inflexible, straight-laced, repressed husband.

Brought up in abject poverty by her neglectful father Grace has no life outside her immediate family and the charismatic, serpent handling congregation of her fathers in rural North Carolina. Her life is her father and his religion--though Grace does not truly or successfully fit into either world. As her life's journey her fathers abuse and negligence will cause most of her siblings to abandon the family and her beloved mother to commit suicide. Eventually her father will totally abandon her and she will turn to--and marry--her rescuer, Travis Word. A noble man in many ways, Travi's considerable advantage in years and near total sexual repression will lead Grace to stray--to disastrous effect.

In spite of all this, Grace manages to find some bearings, raise two successful daughters and develop enough courage to go back "home" and confront her roots and personal demons.

This is a riveting book in many ways. Grace's personal story is as captivating as it is unsettling. The insights into the strange Southern primitive Christian world are mesmerizing. The cast of characters--and it is quite a cast of characters--that populate the novel are enormously engaging. The writing is exquisite.

Some of the other reviews alluded to this being among Lee's less successful novels. If this is here bad stuff--an assessment I find ludicrous--I can hardly wait to get to the good stuff.

A really great novel on many levels.

This story is not for everyone, but the book is well written and admirable. If you have a taste for southern literature then you must spend some time with Lee Smith and I cant think of a better place to start. Read the first two pages and if you are not pulled in by the fine writing then this probably isn't for you. If you're uncomfortable with poor rural snake handling "Christians" then you might pass on this as well.

Rich in character and prose, this is a book to recommend. I felt deeply for the main character, Florida "Grace," as she moved through a troubled childhood of religious fanatacism, to marriage and children, to walking out on the marriage to take up with a stoned painter. It's a book of self-discovery and forgiveness.

Grace grows up in a home of mixed-up worship. Her mother, Fannie, worships her father as her savior. And her father, a serpent-handling evangelist, worships himself. Jesus gets all mixed up in it, leaving Grace to doubt her fundementalist upbringing and subsequent marriage. She turns to a total opposite--a godless self-indulgent handyman. She learns of drugs and alcohol, and of course, that life fails her too.

The ending left some questions. It was very easy to read suicide into the scenerio. Grace was called to join her dead mother. But I believe it was actually a re-birth. She joined her mother in the body of Christ. It was His call she heard and obeyed--a relationship that wouldn't fail her.

i stumbled upon this book by accident. IT hasnt left my night stand since.I love the southern dialouge,and the mention of the small southern towns. I recommend this book for anyone wanting a real taste of the south.Thank you Lee Smith for a wonderful book.

Smith is becoming the Faulkner of the Appalachian region and her books just keep getting better. The details of the snake-handling community are fabulous. You live the experience with Florida Grace and cannot go away unaffected.

Make no mistake about it, I enjoyed reading this story told in first person by the daughter of a snake-handling, fundamentalist preacher who exhibits more lunacy than religion. And all the characters are well drawn and very believable. But as did several other reviewers, I too found the ending to be disappointing, even jarring. It seems to me the author, near the end, lost sight of the Grace Shepherd she developed through the first 250 pages, a young girl and later a woman who was intelligent, reflective, and often independent in her thinking. She would not have returned to the church of her father and its dangerously ridiculous routines. More likely an ending would have been the angry, stalking return of her Southern-boy lover from whom she stole several thousand dollars.

I agree with the other reviewers that the book did not end the way I had hoped or expected . . . I had hoped that Grace would find salvation and peace with God but not by going back to her father's church. I re-read the first few chapters immediately after finishing the novel and felt that gave me a better sense of the story.
Most of the novel "rang true" to me, I very much enjoyed the language & use of dialect.
This is the first of Lee Smith's works I've read but it won't be the last --

Saving Grace is easily one of the best novels you'll ever read. The subtle, clever writing style of Lee Smith draws you into the life of Grace as she battles poverty, religious fanaticism, and searches for her lost identity. Smith's perceptions about the life, feelings, and untapped potential of her character leave the reader with a stronger understanding of the hard lives these Appalachian women live. She brings into light a forgotten group of people and through Grace, increases the reader's own personal awareness.

Read this one years ago, but still have on my shelf. I have a Lee Smith collection.............they are all wonderful!

Everyone should read all her books................you won't be disappointed

I read this in one sitting. It was my first book of Lee Smith's and I'll definitely try another.

The Positive: the subject matter is so fascinating and bizarre, you can't help but turn the pages, and Smith can obviously spin a good yarn. Her protagonist, Grace, is both witness and confessor to her family's unraveling, and to Smith's credit the story is never maudlin. She does a good job of understatement, allowing the reader to see events through Grace's, not society's, eyes. What would ordinarily seem horrific, seems reasonable with Grace allowed to mitigate the narrative.

The negative: Well into the book, between Grace's marriage to Travis and the introduction of Randy, I wondered if a chapter was missing. The contrast is so jarring, it was like listening to a different voice. With more compelling motivation, this transition might have worked, but as is, seemed to come out of left field. If the author had taken more time, slowed down a little bit, I think she would have pulled this off.

A smaller beef was the entrance/exit of the "sinister" Lamar. While his character exposed a weakness of Grace, and her father----it fell short of promise and did little to drive the plot. Things were going to end badly regardless of this boy. And how much better would this story have been if Lamar had replaced Randy? Or if he'd been the one to expose her adultery?

Looking forward to reading this author's other books.