Customer Reviews

The Slow Moon: A Novel

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

 

 

The Slow Moon is the story of what happens when the small town of South Pittsburg, TN is thrown into turmoil when an act of unspeakable brutality is committed against one of its children. Crow Davenport, 16, and his 14-year-old girlfriend, Sophie Chabot, sneak away from a party to make love when Crow remembers that he forgot his condoms in his car. He leaves Sophie to retrieve them, and in his absence Sophie is raped and assaulted. When he hears police sirens upon returning to the scene, Crow's first instinct is to flee, which he does.

The aftermath of Crow's decision and the harsh reality of what happened to Sophie cause life in South Pittsburg to virtually halt. There is a sea filled with accusations and doubts that flows through the heart of the locals. Some cannot believe that Crow, a priveleged child whose father is one of the most wealthy men in the town, would be capable of assaulting anyone; while others grasp on their need to blame someone and choose Crow as the scapegoat. Though Crow and Sophie are clearly at the forefront of the story, Cox also takes care with her descriptions of the other residents of South Pittsburg so the reader truly understands how invested they are in what happened.

The Slow Moon is more than just a story about a girl who was raped and her boyfriend's efforts to acquit himself of the crime, but a beautifully woven tale about trust and mistrust, doubts and accusations, and the struggle to put back together something that may be irreparably shattered. I picked up this book because my favorite author, Elizabeth Berg, once said that she would buy anything Elizabeth Cox ever wrote. I am now in agreement. This story was beautifully written and told with such poignance and grace that it's hard to find fault with any part of it. I read it in about four hours and if you pick it up, prepare to read it in one sitting. It's that good.

The centerpiece of Elizabeth Cox's cautionary novel The Slow Moon is a childhood friendship that ends in betrayal and treachery. With spring just beginning, the beautiful copper-coloured moon hovers over South Pittsburgh, Tennessee as two young teenagers, Crow Davenport and his girlfriend Sophie leave a party and walk into the woods toward the river to be alone.

Fuelled by adolescent lust, the two begin to undress, eager to explore each other's bodies. Realizing that he is without condoms, Crow returns to his car, leaving Sophie waiting expectantly by the riverbank. However, upon his return, he discovers that Sophie has been brutally raped and she is now semi-conscious and covered in blood. As the sounds of police sirens are heard, Crow panics, frightened he will be blamed, he races off, leaving his beloved Sophie to her fate.

But it's all too late, as Sophie remembers nothing of the evening, or her attackers, except that she was with Crow that night. With his wallet discovered at the scene of the crime, and blood found on his leg, the evidence is automatically damning. This privileged boy from one of South Pittsburgh's wealthiest families is placed on trial for rape.

In the light of day, Crow continues to maintain his innocence and is supported by Helen, his religious mother and Carl his reserved, detached stepfather. Helen's heart struggles against the idea that Crow might be guilty of something terrible, whilst Crow tries to imagine Sophie and why he felt the need to lie, he remembered kissing her, but over the days she becomes almost "faceless as he remembered."

As consensus amongst the community begins to build that Crow may indeed be innocent, the police begin looking at the possibility more than one person did that this. Findings at the crime scene indicate the evidence of sperm from multiple attackers. Certain boys are questioned, with the feeling that everyone knows more than they are saying and it is determined there were other boys who attended the party that night who were drunk and stoned.

Bobbie, the handsome son of Judge Aurelia Bailey and Crow's childhood best friend was one of the boys at the party. Lately Aurelia has noticed that Bobby has grown secretive and sullen. Could Bobby have raped Sophie? He certainly had a terrible crush on her, after first noticing her when Sophie and her mother Rita moved to South Pittsburgh from Montana with thoughts of new beginnings and of hope.

And what about the enigmatic Tom Canady? A member of Crow and Bobbie's rock band, Tom has developed a crush on Crow's younger brother Johnny, their furtive sexual experimentations taking place over a period of months, the frustration of keeping their affair a secret growing into a steady anger at each other. Over the last few years, Tom has realized who and what he was, creating for himself the burdensome role of an imposter.

Cox conjures up an intricate mix of damaged people, all shouldering their respective secrets and burdens, and having to face the moral dilemmas of living in the modern world. Bobbie's lost father is found, and Crows own father, his real one had been lost. Helen finally realizes that Carl is cheating on her with her sister Ava - she can see it in his body. She has almost confronted him once, but could not imagine what life would be like after such a confrontation.

Carl tries frantically to toughen the bookish Johnny up by encouraging him with outdoor pursuits, whilst Aurelia, although trying as she might, cannot escape her ex-husband's criminal past. The novel is awash in issues of boyhood masculinity, the mysteries of sexual fluidity and the consequences heterosexual infidelity.

These teenagers are assuaging a barely drifting edge of sexuality. Obviously eager, these boys, think they are, but are not yet men, just don't want to think about the price it takes to be men, "wanting instead to blaze, the rage, the danger they think are men."

Sophie eventually returns to Montana to stay with friends, to get away and to perhaps get a new perspective, so that she might help her remember something about that terrible night. It is still impossible to believe that Carl was actually responsible, especially considering his reputation at school, academically and socially, and that he's from a good family - he had never been arrested or even been in trouble.

Cox has written a reflective and quite thought-provoking novel on the dangers of kids growing up in a precarious and uncertain world. These are months of anguish for Carl and for Sophie, who yearns desperately to remember, and when she finally does, the central familiaral relationships of the story are tested to the limit.

Written in a type of confessional, and cautionary tone, The Slow Moon is indeed a deeply haunting journey, where teenagers act shockingly and irresponsibly, but are in the end somewhat trapped and ensnared by the endlessly self-absorbed behavior of those around them. Mike Leonard August 06.

Elizabeth Cox is a writer with potential, able to

utilize the beauty and mystery of words and

language.

This is a novel about what happens in the after-

math of rape in a small town. The victim does

not remember what happened and the rest of the

town tries to forget by not attending to any

clues or suspicions.

I look forward to Elizabeth Cox's next novel.

Reading this book was painful. There were too many people to keep track of, and I did not care about any of them. I found the writing disjunct, and told from too many points of view. I could not WAIT for the book to end.

Read this book over a weekend. Not bad.

Normally, if I am not thrilled with a book it takes me a while to read. This one held my interest as the writing was clear; smooth.

It was easy to know you where "there" during the tragic events of a party, where teens acted like teens.

The book was suddenly predictable, and I found on the last 10 pages I had read the book before. However, reading the book before did not diminish my entertainment.

3

Toward the middle of the novel, I began to wonder how quickly it had been written. While the beginning has some potential - not so much in the writing, since there was nothing spectacular about the words or how they were presented, but in the plot - the rest of the novel begs for revision.

The plot teeters. From the book description: "Despite Crow's frantic claims of innocence, evidence at the scene suggests his guilt." I expected some ambiguity, some mystery, but right from the beginning we know that Crow isn't to blame, and Cox might as well hang a neon sign with the culprits' names - there's no mystery there.

Cox switches points of view constantly, giving us an omniscient view of the consequences of the rape. But, unfortunately, she remains very distant from the characters; there's not as much pyschological exploration as you'd expect, or want. She sets up an internal conflict with Crow, who feels guilty about running away when he finds his girlfriend raped, but doesn't explore his feelings very deeply and, in the end, puts him in another situational test to redeem himself; however, the situation is so ridiculous that you can't help but laugh. A better situational test could have been included when the rapist reveals himself to Crow. Crow could have punched him or done just about anything besides what he does: yell and flail his arms and tell him to leave. With Sophie, too, you'd expect some deep psychological probing to display her reaction to her rape, but we don't get much there either. She leaves state for a while and paints a little. That's it.

As for the culprits, they're present the entire time, and we're supposed to be surprised when they're identified. Cox even leaves this chapter in a cliff-hanger Dan Brown style. Considering that we know who committed the rape, we'd expect some psychological exploration inside their heads: why they did it, how they feel about it, etc. None of that, at least until the final few pages, but they're more upset about not being able to fish or swim anymore than about what they have done.

So, this book isn't a MYSTERY or a PSYCHOLOGICAL THRILLER, either of which might have been more entertaining. So perhaps this is a COURT DRAMA?

No. The first trial, Crow's, lasts all of one chapter, and you become mainly frustrated with Sophie, who knows he didn't rape her, for not saying, Hey, he didn't rape me. The second trial is conveniently skipped over. We're given a hundred pages of how Sophie is afraid to identify her rapists because she doesn't want to be exposed in a trial. Then we're given no trial.

We're given a lot of background information about other characters, but we don't quite understand the motivations behind the rape, Sophie's silence, or Crow's actions.

There's nothing at all memorable about this book. The writing is very minimalist; Cox basically just tells you what happens. No great descriptions, no great metaphors. Just plain newspaper text, basically. The characters are overwhelming in their numbers (there are about 15 who are central to the story) because nothing too intimate is revealed about any of them. We learn about Crow's history teacher's past, then the history teacher does all of nothing the entire rest of the book.

I wouldn't recommend this to anybody. For a better book exploring the psychological effects that a rape has on a family and a community, read Joyce Carol Oates' We Were the Mulvaneys. You won't be disappointed there.

THE SLOW MOON by Elizabeth Cox

September 26, 2006

Amazon Rating: 4/5 stars

Here's another book that will be a favorite in 2006: THE SLOW MOON by Elizabeth Cox takes place in a small town, and at the center of the story is a young teenage girl who is gang raped shortly after being seen with her boyfriend. Sophie is the teenage girl who is a newcomer to town, and has a hard time fitting in at first. She does seem to be popular with the boys, and soon she has a steady beau, Crow. It is during one fateful night, a night in which the two promised to have sex for the first time, when Crow leaves her for only twenty minutes, but during that time a group of men come and take advantage of Sophie.

The bulk of the story details each person that comes in contact with Sophie, and allows the reader to try to figure out who was part of this gang rape. While the authorities aren't sure if the crime was committed by men unknown to the town, details begin to come out slowly, pieces of a puzzle that don't seem to fit.

I felt this book was well written and while at first I wasn't sure if I would enjoy the story or not, I found Elizabeth Cox's story telling skills to be unique. Her writing alone made the time spent with this book enjoyable, and while the story in itself has probably been done before, it's the way Cox slowly revealed the men who raped Sophie that makes this book worth reading.

This book was so bad on so many different levels; I can hardly fathom where to begin.

I'll start with the characters:

- Each and every one of them, were never personalized. Not once throughout the novel are you, the reader, to feel endured to any of them. They all seemed like lifeless statues.

The dialog was pitiful at best, making the reading of this book nearly painful since it's heavy on dialog. It was unrealistic and undeveloped (just like her characters). For example:

- Every time one of these teenagers would verbally challenge a parent, the parents response would be to the effect of "Okay". OKAY!!! Who the hell is the parent here?!

- I was also disturbed when Sophie tells her rapist that she wants him to turn himself in. And he says... "Okay." ?!?!

I was bothered by the many unrealistic events that took place. For example:

- A mother decides that after missing intimacy in her marriage for an extensive amount of time, she decides that when her child has been missing for one and half days is a good time to make love to her husband again. ?!?!

- Monkeys attack! What a great ending! ?!?!

- A girl invites the man who raped her over to her house to confront him alone. ?!?!

Overall, the characters were limp, the dialog sad, the story line was predictable. What little surprises this book held where the shockingly unrealistic events, such as being attacked by monkeys at the end. I'm still puzzling over what went through the authors head when she thought this was a good idea! The basic idea of the book, from reading the jacket, could have made for a good novel, however, not with this author.

Skip this book, I found it to be an utter waste of my time with so many other good books waiting on my bookshelf. I came away shocked that writing this awful could actually be publishable.

This is the story of lost innocence, of that fine line between 'before' and 'after' that one can never cross back over again. On the surface, this is a story of rape, accusation, and confession, but is much more than that. It takes us beyond the scope of the character's lives and leads us to explore our own. Elizabeth Cox writes with the magic of a Alice Hoffman, the air, the moon all coming alive as participants in the magic of an eventual healing. One would expect from the subject matter that this would be a depressing book, but it is a hopeful book; hopeful that we can rise above the worst in our lives and soar again.

I couldn't put the book down and would recommend it most highly. I'm grateful to have discovered such a fine writer.

This book was an easy read (one day). There were some things about the story line that was entertaining/thought provoking but I agree with some of the other reviews. I don't think a 15 yr old girl would call her rapist to her house and ask him to turn himself in. In the event she did I don't believe his response would be "okay". There were some unrealistic/chessy parts in the story however, I still enjoyed the book.