Brian Kaufman’s A PERSISTENT ECHO is a book about people and what drives them – the need for love and family, the safety of established beliefs and rules, the desire for adventure and experience, and the pain of old hurts and old cruelties. Its characters, particularly the protagonist, are deftly drawn, rendered fully and powerfully human in subtle, elegant prose that draws the reader into their struggles, their emotions, their memories and their hopes, as if they stood real and whole before us. The characters’ quirks, personality traits, backstories and feelings are shown in their actions, from the grief of an old man burying the horse who was his constant companion to the guilt of a pastor who regrets that his preaching could not stop a terrible crime.
Kaufman’s book is lightened with a dry sense of humor and suffused with August Simms’ generous warmth and hard-bought wisdom, and he influences the other characters subtly but effectively, drawing people together with hope, compassion, and courage in the face of bigotry and cruelty. The story takes place in 1897, with the wounds left by the Civil War still fresh on the national psyche, and echoes of more recent, more local violence have also left damage behind them, and yet, nonetheless, there is a pervasive anticipation of a brighter future ahead. The author does an excellent job of painting the currents of bitterness, old memory, and grief just under the surface, and of countering them with a message of real hope in human connection and collective care for each other. The book is decidedly more character-focused than action-focused, and the plot might seem to meander a bit, from event to event, but common threads of emotion and character run through it all, and it never becomes dull or confusing. The things that need resolving get resolved, and the rest is left to the magic of human complexity and imagination. It is a difficult book to read and remain unmoved by, and the more sentimental reader may want to have a handkerchief handy for the most heartrending moments. All in all, this is an excellent study in character and human emotion, and it is highly recommended especially for the reader who likes to be reminded that people in the past were and have always been just people, like us, recognizable and human despite the differences in technology and worldview.
A PERSISTENT ECHO by Brian Kaufman is a poignantly sweet, thought-provoking book about love, found family, and wisdom gained from experience, age, and suffering.
~Catherine Langrehr for IndieReader