Review: Simon the Fiddler (by Paulette Jiles)

My Rating: 3.5 stars

To say that I struggled with rating this book is an understatement.  On the one hand, I absolutely loved the writing!  Paulette Jiles is a masterful writer who has the ability to transport the reader to a completely different time and place — in this case, Texas in 1865, right after the Civil War — through her atmospheric prose.  With the realistic descriptions of the desolate landscape that Simon and his ragtag band travel through, areas mostly devastated by war but yet still contained glimpses of hope for the future, I truly felt like I was inhabiting their world and experiencing the events as they did — which of course is what great historical fiction does.

Despite how much I liked the writing though, I found it difficult to get into the story for some reason.  Perhaps because the story was really really slow-moving, with not much plot to speak of for majority of the book, plus I got tired of Simon’s adventures after a while.  I was actually more interested in each of the characters’ background stories, which sounded much more fascinating, but unfortunately, only tidbits of their stories were shared here and there — instead, most of the narrative was too focused on Simon’s various encounters as he and his friends traveled around trying to find work. It wasn’t until the last third or so of the book that the story picked up enough to keep my interest.

Aside from the story, I also didn’t connect much with the characters, whether main ones or supporting.  I liked Simon as a character and Doris too, but I never really felt invested in their relationship.  It seemed kind of farcical to me the way their relationship progressed, starting with Simon falling in love with Doris (a complete stranger to him at the time) almost instantaneously, then doing everything in his power to make himself worthy enough to pursue her — later when they finally meet, their interaction the entire time felt predictable, clumsy, and largely emotionless.  I basically wasn’t convinced of their relationship, which made those sections where Simon and Doris profess their affinity for each other a bit awkward to read.

My overall sentiment is that I wanted very much to love this book, but ended up merely “liking” it instead.  As I mentioned earlier, the setting was beautifully rendered and the writing was absolutely exquisite, but the story and the characters didn’t quite work for me.  With that said, I seem to be in the minority with this one so I would say please don’t let my review deter you if you were already planning on reading it – if anything, the writing itself makes this a worthwhile read even if the story isn’t great.  Personally, even though, I wasn’t too keen on her newest novel, I am still quite excited to explore Paulette Jiles’s backlist of works, especially her acclaimed News of the World, which has been on my TBR for quite some time.

Received ARC from William Morrow (HarperCollins) via NetGalley.