The Brightest Moon of the Century

Those who read last year’s Christopher Meeks short story collection Months and Seasons will likely remember Edward, a boy trying to cope with the sudden death of his mother with very little support from his still grieving father. Edward, already having a tough time adjusting to life without his mother, has the rest of his world turned upside down when his father decides to send him to an all-boys private school for rich kids. But by the end of that story, “Hands,” Edward and his father are starting to figure things out and it appears that, together, they might just make it.

The Brightest Moon of the Century, Meeks’s debut novel, uses the same short story to kick off its account of Edward Meopian’s life from ages 14 to 45. Edward, at age 14, is perfectly content to blend into life’s background, seeing that as the best way to avoid trouble with bullies, teachers and intimidating people of all stripes, including girls his age. However, when he finds it impossible to lose himself in the crowd at his new school, Edward begins to focus on solving life’s two biggest mysteries as he sees them: girls and finding that niche in the universe meant just for him.

There is a bit of Everyman in Edward and, like many of us, he sometimes takes life’s path of least resistance rather than the straightest one toward his goals, causing him to reach those goals a little later, but much wiser, than others. Because of that habit, he finds himself for a while running a trailer park mini-mart deep in the heart of Alabama and working in the back room of a southern California camera shop before finally gaining access to the prestigious Los Angeles film school program of which he dreamed for so long.

Edward Meopian, by his mid-forties, puts together almost exactly the life he dreamed about as a young man. He has the beautiful wife, the son, and the dream career he dared chase. Life, though, has a few more surprises for Edward but, this time, he is ready for them. He has lived, and he has learned, and now the brightest moon of the century gives him hope that the best part of his life is still ahead of him.

The Brightest Moon of the Century is one man’s story, a very ordinary man, at that, but Christopher Meeks has filled that story with enough interesting characters and episodes to remind just how limitless and filled with surprises even the most ordinary of lives can be. Meeks’s characters, and his slightly off centered view of life, continue to remind me of John Irving’s early work, definitely a good thing.

I wonder where Edward will end up - and what he will think about it all when he looks back at the lonely 14-year-old boy he once was. As John Lennon once said, "Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans."

Rated at: 5.0

Months and Seasons

I find short stories to be like snapshots, quick peeks into worlds and situations I would otherwise never have experienced. The best of them have an easy rhythm that lends itself to an almost effortless reading experience and allows me to lose myself in the stories for the whole time it takes me to read their fifteen or twenty pages. But all too often these days, short story collections are similar to the CDs being produced by the major record labels: great title track, one or two other catchy tunes, plus a whole lot of filler material needed to bring the whole thing to the required twelve tracks. I am pleased to report that if Months and Seasons, the new collection from Christopher Meeks, was a music album, many of its twelve pieces would be destined for the charts – no filler here.

As suggested by the book’s title, the stories offer short looks into the lives of characters that are experiencing the various seasons of a lifetime. There are stories about children, about young singles and couples, about couples closer to middle age, and about men even closer to the ends of their lives. But whatever their age, all of these characters are coping as best they can with the problems and situations that life is throwing at them at that moment. Some of their conflicts are of the life-changing variety and others are of the everyday type similar to what most readers will have experienced for themselves at some point in their own lives. The particular beauty of this story collection is how Meeks is able to make his reader care as much about the little girl trying to get over her fear of water as for the aged writer who is about to lose a lifetime’s accumulation of memories to an out-of-control brush fire.

I find it difficult to choose a favorite Months and Seasons story from those that strike me as being exceptionally memorable. If pressed to choose just one, I would likely end up with “The Wind Just Right,” the story of a little girl who is lulled into losing her fear of water, and actually learns to swim, in the hands of a young teacher who herself learns that she is exactly the teacher this little girl needs, someone the little girl will probably remember for the rest of her life. The way that both girls gain self-confidence and the ability to trust their instincts makes this a beautiful story.

In “The Sun Is a Billiard Ball,” one of the longer stories in the book, a couple fearing they have been exposed to AIDS and a man exhibiting symptoms of a deadly cancer find their lives intersecting in a way that could have not been foreseen by any of them even a split second before it happened. The courage, love and humor of this story make it one destined to be remembered. But, because I don’t want to mislead anyone, I should note that Meeks handles humor and absurd situations as well as he handles serious topics. In fact, he opens the book with the humorous “Dracula Sinks into the Night,” about what starts out as the costume party from hell for one man but turns into an unexpected blessing for him and his wife.

There is even a “bonus track” at the end of the collection, a preview of the book that Mr. Meeks is working on now, The Brightest Moon of the Century, a novel that will, in short story form, cover thirty years in the life of its central character, Edward. “The Hand,” which closes Months and Seasons, is actually the first chapter of that new book, a chapter in which young Edward and his father are both forced to do a bit of growing up. I can’t decide whether to call “The Hand” a trailer or a teaser but its inclusion in this collection was a brilliant idea because it has left me so intrigued to learn the rest of Edward’s story that I will jump at the chance to read The Brightest Moon of the Century when it is available. Trailer, teaser and very fine short story all rolled into one, it worked well.

Rated at: 5.0

Book Giveaway

Christopher Meeks sends word that Backward Books is giving away a copy of his most recent book, The Brightest Moon of the Century. All it takes to put your name in the hat for the random drawing is a visit to Backward Books. Just leave a comment to the Meeks interview you will find there and you are automatically entered.

Book Chase readers might recall that I gave high marks to The Brightest Moon of the Century last Feburary and I know now that it will finish somewhere in my top 10 favorites of 2009. So here's your chance to pick up a nice freebie.

If we get a winner via Book Chase, please let me know. That would make my day.

Best Books of 2009

This year I have combined my fiction and my nonfiction reading into one list of my 2009 favorites. The only two nonfiction books to make the list, in fact, sandwich my eight favorite novels of the year. After studying similar lists on other book blogs these last few days, I am fascinated that there is so little overlap on any of them, including this one. So many great books...so little time to read them.

Even more fascinating to me is that six of the eight novels listed are debut novels. I doubt that will ever happen to me again.

1. Louisa May Alcott: The Woman Behind Little Women – Harriet Reisen
This Louisa May Alcott biography answered all the questions I had about the Alcott family and its relationship with many of the literary stars and great thinkers of its day. The book is written in a very readable style and, because most readers already know so much about Louisa and her family, it almost reads like a novel. From my review of the book: "There is so much here that even the biggest Alcott fan will come away with a new appreciation of what this great writer accomplished in her relatively short lifetime."

2. Spooner – Pete Dexter
Pete Dexter has what some would consider a rather peculiar sense of humor – and I enjoy it so much I could listen to him tell stories all day long. The next best thing to that experience is reading a Pete Dexter novel and Spooner, in which Dexter creates one of his more memorable characters (Warren Spooner), is a real treat for Pete Dexter fans. From my review of the book: "He arrived only a few seconds after his more handsome twin brother and, even though his twin never took a breath, Spooner knew that his dead brother would always be his mother’s favorite child."

3. Bad Things Happen – Harry Dolan
Harry Dolan pays tribute to those who preceded him. Bad Things Happen is of the Raymond Chandler/James Cain/Dashiell Hammett school of mystery writing and this, Dolan's first novel, does not suffer in the comparison. From my review of the book: Its finely-crafted plot, filled with unexpected twists and turns, will keep readers guessing the murderer’s identify all the way to the end – wondering even to the last page if they have it figured out this time.”

4. The Brightest Moon of the Century – Christopher Meeks
This debut novel, based on one of my favorite Chris Meeks short stories, begins when Edward Meopian is 14-years old and ends when he is 45. A lot happens to Edward in those three decades, very little of it planned, and most of it seeming to get him no closer to achieving his dream. And when he does finally get there, life happens. From my review of the book: “Meeks’s characters, and his slightly off-centered view of life, continue to remind me of John Irving’s early work, definitely a good thing.”

5. Etta: A Novel – Gerald Kolpan
If you’re like me, I’ll bet you still have an imaged embedded in your brain of Etta Place riding a bicycle in that classic move about Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid. I’ll also bet that pretty much everything you know about Etta Place, you acquired from that one movie. Really, not much is known about Etta and how she became an outlaw, but Gerald Kolpan’s version of “what if” is great fun to read. From my review of the book: “First-time novelist Gerald Kolpan now offers Etta, the perfect companion piece to the movie that reintroduced Etta to the world some forty years ago.”

6. Travel Writing - Peter Ferry
This is a first novel that takes a (excuse me for this) novel approach to storytelling. Peter Ferry is the main character of his own novel and, beginning with the book's dedication, the reader will be wondering what is real and what is not. Ferry pulls off to great effect here one of those "novel within a novel" things and I suspect he drove more than a few readers nuts in the process. From my review of the book: "Peter Ferry is a storyteller and his debut novel, Travel Writing, is one terrific story.

7. American Rust: A Novel - Philipp Meyer
Yet another debut novel, but a much more serious one than the ones previously mentioned, American Rust takes a long, hard look at life in small town America. Meyer's story is a tragic one involving a bright young man whose life goes wrong in an instant, so wrong that he fears he could end up spending the rest of his life in prison. From my review of the book: "American Rust, Philipp Meyer’s debut novel, is a hard story to forget. Beyond a doubt, it is one of the bleakest portrayals of small town America written since the Great Depression and its plot, for good reason, is a reminder of the fiction that came out of that era."

8. Rain Gods: A Novel - James Lee Burke
James Lee Burke is a master at his craft, a man I've read since the '80s and whose work I always snap up as soon as it is published. I feel like Dave Robicheaux is a personal friend; I even own a baseball cap that features Dave's old bait shop on the front and I actually wear it around town just to see if anyone gets the joke. Rain Gods, though, is a Hack Holland novel, not one of Dave's. I don't yet feel quite as attached to Hack as I do to Dave but Mr. Burke is getting me closer with every novel. This is one of the most atmospheric novels I've read in a long while and the writing is simply beautiful. Enough said.

9. Woodsburner: A Novel - John Pipkin
Would you believe another excellent debut novel? This one is about what had to be perhaps the worst day in Henry David Thoreau's life, the day he accidentally set fire to the Concord Woods and almost burned down the city of Concord. Pipkin uses this largely forgotten incident from Thoreau's life to create one of the best character studies of 2009. From my review of the book: "In the process of creating a back-history for each of his main characters, Pipkin provides a revealing look at Massachusetts society of the 1840s and theorizes on how Thoreau’s mistake heavily influenced the rest of his life and career."

10. Where Men Win Glory - Jon Krakauer
Pat Tilman is a hero, a special young man who felt it was his duty to defend America after the 9-11 murders. Most everyone knows how Tilman gave up a multi-million dollar contract to join the Army's special forces and of his death in Afghanistan. Jon Krakauer tells the rest of the story, including the military's attempt to cover up what really happened in the tragic firefight that killed Pat Tilman. From my review of the book: "Human nature being what it is, almost from the moment Tillman’s body was recovered, some on the ground seem to have been more concerned with covering up the poor tactical decisions that contributed to his death than they were about reporting the truth."