Michael Kimball breathes life into American experimental fiction in this moving debut novel. The tale reads on one level like timeless myth-making, as the family makes its way from Texas to Michigan with their infant child, a few days past his funeral, in the car trunk. But the unusual narration, and Kimball’s adeptness at imparting grief through both the telling and the silences, make “The Way the Family Got Away” the freshest literary fiction. The stories of the death, the family, and the trip north are told through the alternating voices of the surviving young brother and sister: The brother tells the tale in terms of which possessions the family must barter to get from one town to the next, while the sister narrates the doll version of the family drama and hopes to bring her baby brother--magically--back to life. In Kimball's novel we find a domestic fiction more often rendered by women: an emotional tale of narrow perameters and deep impact. This writer is one to watch: Highly recommended for both academic libraries interested in literary or American fiction, and medium-to-large public libraries.

This book is about a family who are making their way from Mineola, Texas to Bompa's house in Gaylord in their car, trading their clothes and other possessions for petrol as they go. The family are a mother, father, brother and sister. We learn early on that the family have recently suffered the death of the youngest baby son from yellow fever, and have decided to move away for a fresh start at Bompa's house, shedding all reminders of their past life as they go. In their profound grief, they take the body of the youngest son with them when they leave Mineola, digging it out of the grave and keeping it in the boot of the car during their journey.

The bereavement has a severe effect on the family, and the children seem to feel that they themselves are being stripped away as they lose more and more of their toys and clothes to other children. The mother trades away her wedding dress and wedding rings, while the father gives away his wallet and the contents of the glove box. They are empty, and seem to be trying to get rid of their grief by getting rid of every physical possession that made them what they were before. They hope for a new baby to make the family complete again.

The unusual thing about this book is the narration. Each chapter is told in turns by the little boy and the little girl, both of whom have distinctive ways of understanding what is happening to them, and they relate events in ways that make you think carefully about what is actually happening, and are quite heartbreaking at times. The little girl for instance, uses her 'doll-family' to act out how she'd like her 'people-family' to be - her voice in particular gives the book an individuality and a warmth, but at the end of the day, this is a story about tragedy and loss that is worth reading for the children's perspectives on their journey. ( )