It’s 1916, and America is on the cusp of rapid change, some will seize the opportunity, others will cling to a past soon good for nothing other than fond, and frequently false, memories. Keystone Steam Works has an international reputation for building steam-powered machines like mobile well-drillers, steam shovels and tractors. They even have a prototype of a steam-powered automobile called the Lylemobile. The family-owned business, now run by third-generation Malcolm Lyle, has been one of the primary employers in the Furnass, a small town on the banks of the Ohio River. This distinction and wealth amassed by the company have afforded the family privilege and prestige, but that status, like the future of the company is threatened by changing social conventions and advancing technology. Poor personal choices, business decisions and circumstances have left the family rife with drama and enduring moral decay and the business unprepared for the challenges of a new era. One character, who has mistakenly married into the family describes them as “… a collection of fools, a family whose values were based on pretense and delusion, self-deception and ignorance, a family who lacked true refinement and intelligence.” Financial salvation presents itself in the form of a government contract to produce military tanks using steam technology. It would mean retooling the company and discontinuing the production of the Lylemobile, thus crushing his son’s dream of competing with the new gasoline-powered vehicles. Malcolm’s decision will seal the fate of the company and his family.
The central figure in ALL THAT WILL REMAIN, this circus of human folly is Perpetual, a Caribbean woman indentured by Malcolm’s father to look after the health and the interests of the matriarch of the family, his wife, Libby. Through subtle manipulation, strength of will, essential service that embodies love and even medicinal herbal remedies, this enigmatic figure benignly controls the domestic life of the entire Lyle family. Told from multiple points of view, author Richard Snodgrass introduces a host of well-defined characters whose vulnerabilities, though human, manifest into a spiral of delusion and defeat and lack the courage and strength to extricate themselves. The narrative is interspersed with passages of untethered streams of consciousness that flow effortlessly and seamlessly with intoxicating effect.
Author Richard Snodgrass’s masterful prose immerses the reader in a story that is layered and nuanced, with well-researched glimpses of history and mores of a bygone time. Lyrical and dreamlike, ALL THAT WILL REMAIN explores human character and how it’s shaped by position, wealth and, most importantly, family.
~Rod Raglin for Indie Reader