Fractures
A Novel
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
A Thousand Acres and Empire Falls meet during the present hydrofracking controversy as a beleaguered patriarch must decide the fate of his land and children in this enveloping family drama
The Joyner family sits atop prime Marcellus Shale. When landmen for the natural gas companies begin to lease property all around the family's hundred acres, the Joyners start to take notice. Undecided on whether or not to lease the family land, Frank Joyner must weigh his heirs' competing motivations. All of this culminates as a looming history of family tragedy resurfaces.
A sprawling family novel, Fractures follows each Joyner as the controversial hydrofracking issue slowly exacerbates underlying passions and demons. With echoes of Jonathan Franzen's Freedom, Fractures takes its reader deep into the beating heart and hearth of a family divided
"Lamar Herrin's Fractures is a brilliantly conceived and executed novel that illustrates how coping with familial dysfunctions can help us understand and deal with the more deadly dysfunctions of society. Here's one of my favorite writers at his finest." —Ron Hansen, author of The Assassination of Jesse James
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
With hydrofracking and its effects so conspicuously in the news, it's surprising that Herrin's first novel in seven years (Romancing Spain) reads so ponderously, perhaps as too many characters are given prominent points of view, or because intimate details are revealed in an oddly detached manner. The story of a man named Frank Joyner who must decide whether to lease the mineral rights on his fami-ly's land situated over the Marcellus Shale to a natural gas company or be "compulsorily integrated" and receive less compensation may satisfy metaphorically, but not as a narrative. Joyner, an all-but-retired architect known for repurposing old, decaying buildings, is philosophically opposed to hydro-fracking, but when his ex-son-in-law, a scheming lawyer, intrudes, he acquiesces, and drilling com-mences. The book's narrative builds upon his decision, while its metaphoric underpinnings derive from hydrofracking and compulsory integration, downward and outward drilling, and forced participation. The story unfolds through the eyes of multiple characters, including Frank and members of his family, the wise woman he quietly loves, his ex-son-in-law, and the landman whose thoughtfulness convinces Frank to lease his land. The land is not the Joyner family's sole legacy. Sadness and suicide are in its genes, and both inform these characters' behavior and choices, as well as the plot, which unfortunately moves far too slowly.
