Anytime I read a book by Charles Frazier, I cannot help but wish that anyone who ever held a pen or used a keyboard could write like him. Nightwoods is another work by this top author that leaves the reader in awe and breathless.

The setting of the story is 1960s Appalachia, North Carolina to be exact, highlighted by the popular names of brands like cigarettes and magazines of the time.

In the story, a young woman, Luce, lives as a caretaker of an old lodge in a small town and receives a stipend for it from the kind owner of the lodge Stubblefield. When Stubblefield dies, Luce continues to live there since no one does anything about it. Luce comes from a dysfunctional family, but she is smart and has paved her own way in life.

Her personal freedom comes to an end, however, when she ends up having to care for the orphaned twins of her sister who was killed by a man named Bud, who the authorities let go for the lack of evidence. The twins, shocked by what they have witnessed, have psychological problems and they do not talk at all but have a communication system among themselves. With Luce's patience and love, they start to learn to say a few words and to respond to Luce's understanding of their problems.

Bud is after the children because he knows they have seen the murder and believes they have his stolen money. In the meantime, Stubblefield's shy and handsome grandson--as the heir to the lodge and its vast surrounding acres--shows up and is taken by Luce's beauty. So far is the set-up.

When Bud shows up in town and finds out where the twins are, the real story begins. The children, re-traumatized, run off to the woods up the mountains in extreme cold with Bud, the townspeople, and the young Stubblefield and Luce searching for them. How the squaring off of Bud and Luce will come about and what will happen to the children is for the reader to find out.

This story is one with exciting action, suspense, and mystery, and poignant, brilliant, lyrical and poetic prose. The style of writing is exquisite and the storytelling to die for. The characters have great depth and the novel just grabs the reader and doesn't let go.

the writing style, the lyrical usage of the language, and everything else.

is Charles Frazier, the author of Cold Mountain, Thirteen Moons, and Nightwoods.

to me, it had everything I valued, which an author could accomplish.

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Created Dec 17, 2014 at 1:31pm • Submit your own review...