Back Roads

This book had me lying awake with my chest aching for an hour after the last page. It was haunting. Devastating. Real.

I thought I had it all figured out, but O'Dell pulled the rug out from under my feet more than once.

Some reviewers claimed to not 'get' Harley as a character or called him too violent or unlikable... To that I say, sometimes a story is just too ugly for people not to look away from it. If nothing else, these characters were tragically, gutwrenchingly human.

Put yourself in the shoes of a 19 year old boy who has been abused his entire life. Rather than being granted the freedom of adulthood, he's trapped to care for his 3 younger sisters and virtually abandoned by the system.

Rage becomes natural as Harley fights to keep show more them alive and striving towards normal, working two dead end jobs just to put cereal and nuked hotdogs on the table.

The girls are equally and uniquely broken by their experiences, so there is no comfort to be found in each other and all four suffer because of it.

Its easy to forget about a few kids out in the backwoods of a Pennsylvania coal mining town. Certainly easier than having to watch. That seems to be one thing we can all agree on, because there are no spectators as their home and the very fabric of their relationships begin to decay.

Except, maybe, for the married woman next door, who sees Harley's struggle and shows him the first human tenderness hes experienced since his mother.

O'Dell doesn't wrap this one up into a neat little package for us and save the day. She says - Tough luck. This is real life, and sometimes real life isn't good or fair in the end. show less

This book had me lying awake with my chest aching for an hour after the last page. It was haunting. Devastating. Real.

I thought I had it all figured out, but O'Dell pulled the rug out from under my feet more than once.

Some reviewers claimed to not 'get' Harley as a character or called him too violent or unlikable... To that I say, sometimes a story is just too ugly for people not to look away from it. If nothing else, these characters were tragically, gutwrenchingly human.

Put yourself in the shoes of a 19 year old boy who has been abused his entire life. Rather than being granted the freedom of adulthood, he's trapped to care for his 3 younger sisters and virtually abandoned by the system.

Rage becomes natural as Harley fights to keep show more them alive and striving towards normal, working two dead end jobs just to put cereal and nuked hotdogs on the table.

The girls are equally and uniquely broken by their experiences, so there is no comfort to be found in each other and all four suffer because of it.

Its easy to forget about a few kids out in the backwoods of a Pennsylvania coal mining town. Certainly easier than having to watch. That seems to be one thing we can all agree on, because there are no spectators as their home and the very fabric of their relationships begin to decay.

Except, maybe, for the married woman next door, who sees Harley's struggle and shows him the first human tenderness hes experienced since his mother.

O'Dell doesn't wrap this one up into a neat little package for us and save the day. She says - Tough luck. This is real life, and sometimes real life isn't good or fair in the end. show less

The TRUTH is the TRUTH sucks sometimes. People are the only ones who care about that. The only difference between me and Elvis [the dog] isn't my ability to face or deal with or deny it. It's that I let it bother me.

Wow, what a complete mind trip. I read this for a reading challenge - which means I knew NOTHING about it and just jumped it. At first, I thought it was a little dark.

I had no idea. The twisted turns and leaps this story takes blew me away and I predicted none of them. Oh, sure. I had some ideas, but never knew what this was about. The mystery as you weave your way through the story is almost overwhelming. You know something is coming you just don't know what. Very well done, well crafted.

Hurley Altmyer is a 19-year-old who has taken on the responsibility for his three younger sisters after their mother has been convicted and sentenced to life in prison for shooting their father. He is hanging on by his fingernails – working two low-paying jobs in an effort to keep their house and the family together. But he is clearly at the breaking point, totally unable to cope or even to face the truth of what has happened and is happening.

This is a dark psychological story of a family caught in a cyclone of dysfunction. It is violent and crass in places. I was caught up in Harley’s life – in his skewed view of the world, and in the downward spiral he is caught in.

I did think the book was rather unrelenting in its psychosis. show more Yes, O’Dell includes some scenes of tenderness, even a few of humor, but it is a powerful and dark vortex in which the Altmyer family (and the reader) is caught. Not a book for the faint of heart. show less

Let me say first, I really liked this book. HOWEVER, it is extremely disturbing and intense. How about I put it this way...there's murder, child abuse, adultery and even worse things (that I can't say because it will spoil the book). So, if you have a weak constitution when it comes to the dark side of human nature - skip this book. Otherwise, I think it is a gripping novel that is definitely worth reading.

I really liked Harley, the flawed narrator, despite the fact that he's not exactly sane nor a necessarily good person (others in a group did not have such a favorable opinion of him). I loved the fact that the reader discovers the twists and turns in the plot as Harley does. I think that is why I felt so much sympathy for his show more character - we were going through this shocking experience together.

I read this book in two sittings as it is quite the page turner. Family secrets, hidden truths, sexual impulses and the Altmyer family legacy of violence converge into an explosive ending. If you can handle a really dark book - I highly recommend Back Roads. show less

There's no doubt that Back Roads is beautifully written, and it rings as being frighteningly believable.

At the same time, perhaps because it did ring so true, a large part of me also wanted a great deal more. For the most part, I knew where it was going, I knew what to expect, and it all seemed so perfectly believable as to have been something I could have read about in the news. Granted, the voice was gritty and real, and not something you'd get in a journalistic account... but I was missing the pull that I want from fiction. It wasn't compelling simply because it was so, simply, what you would expect in the situation presented. There were a few surprises, but not enough, and there were a few moments where I felt truly connected to the show more characters... but not enough.

Depressing, real, and well-written? Yes. And still, I can't imagine picking up another book by the author. I read books to be transported, and for many other reasons, but not to be drawn back to earth and told that dreams are dead where you expect them to be dead. show less

Surely there is no book nearer to "Catcher in the Rye" in tone or protagonist since Salinger himself was publishing than O'Dell's "Back Roads." A story of murder, infatuation, and incest, this book covers all basis at the soap-opera speed-- sans the commercials. Somehow, O'Dell manages to drag the reader along at a believable enough pace. This book is not overdone or trite, despite the spectrum of emotions (and crimes) it covers and its similarities to Salinger's story. It is a convoluted love story, and an ode to the decay of mining-town Pennsylvania. And perhaps because of the book's stretch of plausibility, O'Dell proves herself a capable and proficient writer. She holds everything together with her beautifully honest and realistic show more prose, delivered directly from the head of a teenage boy trying to take care of his little sisters, get a decent paycheck, and lose his virginity. Funny and heart-breaking, this narration is painfully open for empathy. A book you have to put down just to process your emotional response and to say out loud to yourself how good it is, and certainly one that you will mourn when it's over. That is, until you read it again. show less