Rating:  ☆1/2

Recommended by:

Author:   Paul Harding

Genre:  Fiction

192 pages, published January 1, 2009

Reading Format:  Book

Summary

An old man lies dying.  Propped up in his living room and surrounded by his children and grandchildren, George Washington Crosby drifts in and out of consciousness, back to the wonder and pain of his impoverished childhood in Maine.  As the clock repairer’s time winds down, his memories intertwine with those of his father, an epileptic, itinerant peddler and his grandfather, a Methodist preacher beset by madness.

Quotes 

 “And as the ax bites into the wood, be comforted in the fact that the ache in your heart and the confusion in your soul means that you are still alive, still human, and still open to the beauty of the world, even though you have done nothing to deserve it.”

 

“What of miniature boats constructed of birch bark and fallen leaves, launched onto cold water clear as air? How many fleets were pushed out toward the middles of ponds or sent down autumn brooks, holding treasures of acorns, or black feathers, or a puzzled mantis? Let those grassy crafts be listed alongside the iron hulls that cleave the sea, for they are all improvisations built from the daydreams of men, and all will perish, whether from the ocean siege or October breeze.”

 

“Everything is made perish; the wonder of anything at all is that it has not already done so. No, he thought. The wonder of anything is that it was made in the first place. What persists beyond this cataclysm of making and unmaking?”

 

“Who was the greatest business man ever. . . The greatest salesman? Advertiser? Who? . . . It was Jesus. . . Jesus was the founder of modern business. . . he picked up twelve men from the bottom ranks of business and forged them into an organization that conquered the world!”

 

“…I will be no more than a tint of some obscure color, and to their great grandchildren nothing they ever know about, and so what army of strangers and ghosts has shaped and coloured me until back to Adam, until back to when ribs were blown from molten sand into the glass bits that took up the light of this world….”

 

“Howard resented the ache in his heart. He resented that it was there every morning when he woke up… He resented equally the ache and resentment itself. He resented his resentment because it was a sign of his limitations of spirit and humility, no matter that he understood that such was each man’s burden. He resented the ache because it was uninvited, seemed imposed, a sentence, and, despite the encouragement he gave himself each morning, it baffled him because it was there whether the day was good or bad, whether he witnessed major kindness or minor transgression, suffered sourceless grief or spontaneous joy.”

My Take

I labored through Tinkers, which has won numerous awards, including the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, and was happy just to finish it.  Sometimes I think there is an inverse correlation between the prestige of the award bestowed on a book and its readability.  That was certainly the case for me with this book.  There wasn’t much of a plot and what there was seemed to disjointed and uninteresting.  Even worse were the characters.  No one memorable or impressive.  My advice is to skip Tinkers.