River of Dust
A Novel
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2.0 • 1 Rating
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- $14.99
Publisher Description
On the windswept plains of northwestern China, Mongol bandits swoop down upon an American missionary couple and steal their small child. The Reverend sets out in search of the boy and becomes lost in the rugged, corrupt countryside populated by opium dens, sly nomadic warlords and traveling circuses. This upright Midwestern minister develops a following among the Chinese peasants and is christened Ghost Man for what they perceive are his otherworldly powers. Grace, his young ingénue wife, pregnant with their second child, takes to her sick bed in the mission compound, where visions of her stolen child and lost husband begin to beckon to her from across the plains. The foreign couple’s savvy and dedicated Chinese servants, Ahcho and Mai Lin, accompany and eventually lead them through dangerous territory to find one another again. With their Christian beliefs sorely tested, their concept of fate expanded, and their physical health rapidly deteriorating, the Reverend and Grace may finally discover an understanding between them that is greater than the vast distance they have come.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In her debut novel, Pye, the granddaughter of missionaries, addresses the near-unrelenting tragedy of missionary work in China after the Boxer Rebellion. Mongolian nomads steal the child of a minister and his pregnant wife Grace, sending the Reverend in search of his son. Along the way he loses his health, faith in God, and reputation. Grace stays behind to grapple with her loneliness, a nervous condition, bloody coughing, the threat of a miscarriage, near death in childbirth, and hunger created by famine. Pye has the imagination to put the elements in play, but it proves too much to juggle. Grace doesn't fret much about her kidnapped son as supposedly worrying exacerbates her nervous condition though she regularly frets about her husband. Early on, Pye shows us the Reverend reflecting on his faith, demonstrating a profound level of insight into such matters, yet the process of how he feels in losing that faith isn't revealed. All the same, when Grace shows us her unabiding love for the Reverend we see the author's ability to pull beauty from this cacophony of tragedy. Pye's prose is speckled with moments of beauty, but the glaring gaps in the narrative make it an inconsistent read.
