Book review: Demon Copperhead
Someone at my book club recommended we read Demon Copperhead when we met in mid-April. I gasped out loud because I had already read the first chapter on Amazon when the book was released and had immediately added it to my to be read list.
What drew me to this book is how much I related to the description. The small town in Lee County, Virginia where the book takes place sound just like Acworth, Georgia when I was growing up, a poor kid living on Glade Road.
The lead character can best be described as street smart, although he wasn’t out on the streets in his early life. He had a good example from the charitable neighbor family who his mom rented their single wide trailer from. They would prove to be the only constant in his life.
It’s a long, dark book. It pulls you in from the very first paragraph. The dialect is spot on. I didn’t realize Kingsolver is from Virginia and Kentucky, so I wondered right away how she knew so many phrases I grew up hearing.
It will wreck you. She captures the hopelessness of addiction in such a painful way.
The child neglect experienced through the foster care system is a gut punch, as is the domestic abuse coupled with abject poverty. You’re going to need some time to process all the new information you have just read. I finished it a week ago and I am still thinking about the characters, wondering what they may be doing now, as if they were real. Kingsolver made them real to me, and apparently all of the other people that have kept the book on the New York Times bestseller list for 26 weeks since its publication in October, 2022.
Ann Patchett said about Kingsolver: “She means to save us by telling us stories. She comes closer than anyone else I know. She’s able to tell us things we desperately need to know in a way that makes it possible for us to hear it.”
So, consider yourself dutifully warned. This book has some dark themes. Several social injustices happening to one character. Like me, you probably knew about them, I just didn’t know the full extent. Anyone who has been a victim of domestic abuse, addiction, poverty, or child neglect may benefit from having ongoing discussion with someone while reading it. It is also 560 pages long, but it is a page turner! I recommend reading it when you know you have the time to dedicate to it because it is hard to put down!
Lastly, I will say what most of us who have read it have probably thought at one time or another…”Someone in Hollywood has to pick this up for a movie!”
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