A Union Soldier Tracks a Killer in “Chenneville” https://ift.tt/dBoquOx
I don’t mind admitting that I love well-written historical fiction. Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall trilogy, Maggie O’Farrell’s Hamnet, and EJ Levy’s TheCape Doctor are excellent examples of the genre done well. Each of these authors tells a compelling story through the lens of time with believable and fully engaging characters, and chock-full of interesting period details.
Paulette Jiles is another author who writes terrific historical fiction, focusing on the Civil War era. Jiles’ latest novel, Chenneville: A Novel of Murder, Loss, and Vengeance, begins as the Civil War is ending. The protagonist, Union Army First Lieutenant John Chenneville, is recovering from a head injury sustained following an explosion in Petersburg, Virginia. As he wakes from a coma of seven months, Chenneville begins a slow journey back to himself. He remembers being aloft in a hot-air sack floating above the fray at the battle of Yorktown, but did that really happen? He can’t be sure, as he strives to slowly regain his balance, his strength, his memory, the ability to read and write. Most of all, he is fighting for a reason to remain living in the world he returns to, a world radically changed by the war and its aftermath. And yes, he had been aloft on a very early hot-air balloon reconnaissance mission prior to his head injury.
John Chenneville, also known as Jean-Louis, is the son of prominent early French settlers, and the heir to seven hundred acres of rich bottomland between the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers north of St. Louis. He slowly makes his way back home only to find that his beloved younger sister, Lalie, and her family have been murdered in the lawlessness during the war. His mother, his only surviving family member, has been made mute by the tragedy, and has moved to New Orleans where she no longer communicates with others. Their fields lie fallow. All facets of their former life have stopped, as if the war put life there on indefinite hold, waiting for his return. The thought of avenging his sister’s death is what keeps Chenneville alive — and also what might get him killed. He makes his way south through Arkansas and Indian territory, toward Texas, on boats and on horseback, fighting exhaustion, one step behind his sister’s killer, who knows Chenneville is on his trail.
Paulette Jiles is the author of six previous novels, including News of the World, for which she was a finalist for the National Book Award in 2016. But Jiles started her writing career as a poet and her facility with lovely prose imagery shines through Chenneville like a shining beacon:
John watched a small green heron with a S-shaped neck skim low over the river surface… The satiny, emerald-green bird gave out a sinister hoarse roar, oddly un-birdlike, and sailed into the forest on the other side of the river with some distant memory clutched tightly in its folded claws.
Jiles tells a beautiful, multi-layered tale rich with the historical details of the past — the sounds the paddle boats make on the Ohio River; how the telegraph system of the nineteenth century shortened distances between people in remote places and brought much needed news to lonely outposts; how one could tell who the telegraph operator was by their unique way of sending messages; how early photographs called daguerrotypes were washed with a gold solution, giving them depth and golden tones; and how the state of Missouri never seceded from the Union, but was a place of great conflict and bloodshed between the two warring sides.
Chenneville is full of suspense, hardship, and the pathos of a man searching for redemption. The story builds to a fever pitch as he faces each new challenge with a burning desire to avenge his sister and her family. When the ending comes, it seems surprisingly meek, and just slightly disappointing. Even so, I applaud Paulette Jiles’ decision to end the novel in a much quieter way than one would have expected given the intensity of the first three hundred pages of the book. Perhaps she is asking this time-honored question: Does fighting violence with violence ever really work? The ending makes sense in a quieter way, and allows the reader to continue to root for this broken man trying to find peace in a broken world.
I’m happy to read anything Paulette Jiles writes. My favorite of hers remains her first book, Enemy Women. But don’t take my word for it. Read them all and make up your own mind. You won’t be sorry to spend time with Paulette Jiles’ imagination and lovely prose.
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