An Unfinished Season

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OneMansView, March 21, 2011 (view all comments by OneMansView)
The difficulties of understanding someone (4.25*s)

Set in the early 1950s, this rather subdued, contemplative, and observant book is told from the perspective of nineteen-year-old Wils Ravan over the summer just before his entering the University of Chicago, as he attempts to grasp any number of eye-opening situations and individuals. The atmospherics of Chicago infuse the entire book. The author’s Chicago is a busy and tough town, respectful of those who can wield power, and as such demands resilience - a stiff upper lip - from those who want to be key players in the community. In Wils’ world, as defined by his father Teddy Ravan, the owner of a successful printing company north of Chicago, it is simply assumed that communists, unions, Adlai Stevenson, etc are malevolent forces. There is no place for Northeastern liberalism and extraneous sophistication among Chicago’s elites.

While Wils is not a rebellious teen, his more thoughtful approach is at odds with his father’s. In addition to being accepted to the liberal U of Chicago, he questions his father’s intransigent handling of a union strike at his printing plant. His summer job as a copy boy at a downtown newspaper, gotten through his father’s friendship with the publisher, is a world apart from his father’s, who would have been repulsed by the raucous, messy newsroom full of no nonsense, irreverent, and crusty reporters. Wils’ summer of working at the newspaper, attending debutante parties, and being a steady at a jazz club takes a decided turn when he meets Aurora Brule, a daunting, aloof beauty, at one of the parties, who he learns is the daughter of the even more forbidding Jack Brule, a noted psychiatrist and quiet observer at the parties. The remainder of the summer is spent slowly unraveling the mystery surrounding Aurora and her father, which actually culminates in a couple of very intense, disturbing scenarios.

The book is an unhurried, insightful examination of the difficulties of understanding people in the context of culture, class, and their psychological proclivities. The author so captures the careful and cautious language and interactions that slowly reveal personalities, though not totally. “Secrets” are a part of everyone’s makeup ��" at times, “demons.” Perhaps a better resolution could be hoped for among these characters, but in the author’s telling there is an elusiveness about people that makes “finishing” a relationship a most unlikely, difficult undertaking.

In addition, the barriers in crossing class lines is an underlying theme. The reporters can scarcely conceal their disdain for a rich kid on a wanderlust of discovery. Wils manages to escape a threatening situation when he gets lost in a working class Polish neighborhood, his difference being quite evident. It is truly a summer of learning for Wils ��" one that will never be forgotten.

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Product Details

ISBN:

9780618568284

Subtitle:

A Novel

Author:

Just, Ward S

Author:

Just, Ward

Publisher:

Mariner Books

Location:

Boston

Subject:

Literary

Subject:

Young men

Subject:

Loss (psychology)

Subject:

Illinois

Subject:

Domestic fiction

Subject:

Literature-A to Z

Copyright:

2004

Edition Description:

Trade Paper

Publication Date:

May 2005

Binding:

Paperback

Grade Level:

General/trade

Language:

English

Pages:

256

Dimensions:

8.22x5.50x.63 in. .57 lbs.