A Real Page Turner!

Novels by David Baldacci are not the usual fare discussed at a ladies’ book club meeting.

Most of his best sellers fall into the thriller category with Arab terrorists, nuclear threats and Washington D. C. misfits. (The Camel Club, 2006)

Early in his writing career, this attorney turned author gave readers an inside look at the appeal process of the Supreme Court through the eyes of convicted murderer Rufus Harms. (The Simple Truth, 1998)

A 2001 release, Last Man Standing follows an FBI point man’s desperate search for answers after his entire Hostage Rescue Team was gunned down around him in a blind alley.  Not exactly a book club choice either!

But sandwiched between the CIA villains, Secret Service agents and serial killers is Wish You Well, a homespun tale of love across four generations  and, in particular, 1940’s life in the Appalachian mountains of Virginia.

In the opening chapter, a fatal automobile accident forces the family of  a critically acclaimed novelist to leave their New York home  and retreat to the Cardinal family cabin back in the hills.

Awakened at 5 a.m. by their great grandmother also named Louisa Mae Cardinal, Lou, aged 12 and Oz, 7,  soon learn to milk the cows, slop the hogs, feed chickens, drop hay and gather eggs before walking two miles to school every day.

A Virginia resident himself, Baldacci created adventures and hardships familiar to his maternal grandmother, Cora Rose, who spent 60 years in the higher elevations. Even the author’s mother, the youngest of ten children, spent the first 17 years of her life in the same rocky peaks.

Faulting herself for her father’s  death and  mother’s catatonic state, the blond, blue-eyed Lou can not subscribe to her grandmother’s notion that, “Some say believing a person gets better is half the battle”. But younger brother, Oz, never loses faith: talking to Amanda several times each day, brushing her hair and even sleeping in her bedroom on more than one occasion.

Every Baldacci novel must have a villain and moonshiner George Davis is one of the best. An awful man, Davis, “works his children like mules and treats his mules better’n his children,” according to long-time neighbor and adversary, Louisa Mae Cardinal.

Running a close second in evil practices are the executives of The Southern Valley Coal and Gas Company who keep mum about the discovery of natural gas in the Cardinal’s coal mine.  This secret, which pits neighbor against neighbor for a sizable check, will also result in the death of red-haired Jimmy Skinner a.k.a. Diamond – another blow to Lou’s already fragile psyche.

The setting mixes in the glowing beauty of a 100-foot waterfall with the opportune scream of a sleek black panther and a moss encrusted, haunted well to push the reader to the edge of his/her seat in  anticipation of what will happen next .

Add in a four-chapter long Southern trial reminiscent of  the one described in To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee and you’ve got a real page turner.  As in both cases, “The legal system had had its day the only thing absent was justice”.

(Sadly to say, Cotton Longfellow did not possess the expertise of Atticus Finch by his own admission, “I’m not a particularly good lawyer, but I get by”.

Critics found Baldacci’s earlier works written strictly for action, with little character development or setting.  That is not the case with Wish You Well, 2000, number six in his list of 19 books produced in 13 years.  Maybe it’s the author’s  strong family connection to the high Virginia hills or possibly his skill at creating suspense that draws the reader on page after page.

Whatever the reason:  Wish You Well is a well plotted, compelling, action-packed novel – a great choice for any book club discussion.  Questions can be found at www.readinggroupguides.com.