Josh Ritter

I have a list of songwriters that I wish would write novels, and Josh Ritter is certainly one of them. His songs are little stories full of heart. I've been waiting a couple summers to read this one, haven't gotten to it, but July seems a good time to read this one: just look at the gorgeous cover: if you open the book up to see both front and back, you can see the entire shadow of a horse on that ethereal golden background. This is one of those cases where the cover perfectly matches the show more writing inside. As expected, the writing is gorgeous as well. The novel shifts between alternating chapters of Henry Bright during his time in World War I and shortly after the war, when his wife dies during childbirth and Bright and his son are on the run from a man, his two sons and a fire Bright started. Oh and there is the angel horse telling him his son is the Future King of Heaven. My only complaint is it is such a short book. I wish it was hundreds of pages more. Songs are already short enough! I can't wait for the next book from Mr. Ritter... this one certainly can't be the last! show less

If you know Josh Ritter's music, then you know his writing style through and through. His novels are no different. Filled with exquisite detail, they capture the imagination with fantastic characters and plot. Great Glorious tells the tale of a lumberjacking family from the perspective of ninety-plus year old Weldon Applegate on his deathbed. Lumberjacking as a profession, I must admit, is something I don't really think about that much (despite spending four years at a boarding school in the show more hardwood-dense White Mountains. Let me digress: I can remember huge timber trucks overloaded with enormous fresh-cut trees barreling down the winding narrow backroads of Maine. Narrowly missing by what seemed like only inches, these behemoths would rock my father's teeny Dodge Diplomat as they screamed by. My father's lips would be pressed into a grim line as his hands, white knuckled, gripped ten and two on the wheel. I know I heard a swear or two...). Speaking of swearing, Josh Ritter is such a quiet, soft spoken guy that the profanity was a bit of a surprise.
But, back to the plot of The Great Glorious Goddamn Of It All. Elderly Weldon Applegate looks back on his long life. From his hospital bed he remembers his family's land called the Lost Lot, a stretch of mountainside nearly impossible to log. Weldon's family has owned this land deemed too dangerous to describe for generations. It's where good men go to die for want of timber; timber so profitable, the monstrous Linden Laughlin wants it for himself despite the well known bad omens. Through magic and humor, Weldon recounts his battle (at thirteen years of age!) with Linden. Word of caution: there is unexpected violence.
I am always fascinated by character names and Josh's are exceptionally strange: Linden Laughlin, Unto Sisson, Oral Avery, Billy Lowground, Shorty Wade, Joe Moufreau (sounds like Joe Motherfukcer), Weldon and Tom Applegate, and Serwalter Scott (sounds like Sir Walter). There are more to enjoy! show less

”There were no cherubs, no judges, no dying saints. There were no angels or mustard gas, no smoke or beautiful young girls; the dome was simply, blessedly, empty. He felt that he might like to drift in that sky forever, breathe that clean, cold air, and leave the earth below to consume itself.” (page 123)

Musician Josh Ritter has produced a novel that, were it a song, would be one of those heartbreakingly bleak Appalachian folk ballads, sung in a plaintive twang and telling a tale of loss show more and grief and violence and maybe, just maybe, redemption. [Bright’s Passage] is an elegiac reflection on lost innocence and lost faith, told through the story of Henry Bright, a veteran of the Great War who returns home to West Virginia accompanied by an angel. Henry’s history is told backwards, while the plot advances forward, and in this way, we learn about his hardscrabble existence in the mountains, his experience in the war, and the cause of the journey he is now on with his new born son, his angel in the guise of a horse, and a goat. And yes, somehow it all works. After a slow start, the intertwining narratives picked up, and I became enthralled in Henry’s story. show less

99-year-old Weldon Applegate is one of those ornery oldsters with a chip on his shoulder as big as a mountain, and a mouth loud enough to yell his story to all within shouting distance, even loud enough from his hospital bed, from which he narrates his 2 stories: the first, of how he got to that hospital bed, and the second, the story of his youth and his quick growing-up in timber mountain regions of the Norwest. It's full of lumberjack tall tales, puppy love, parental loss, avalanches, show more lumberjacking, heartbreak, and lots of big trees.

This was a really fun read, with a larger-than-life narrator who reminded me of Ove of the eponymous novel. Scrappy, and foul-mouthed, the story of his younger self makes the reader look behind the wheezing old geezer to see the humanity and vulnerability of his youthful self. The writing is vibrant and energetic, the pacing in both stories perfect. There are moments of triumph and heartbreak, laughs and near-cries. show less