Wise Blood by Flannery O’Connor

A young disillusioned WWII veteran returns to his family’s home in Tennessee, only to find it abandoned. With no plan for his future, he decides not to follow in his grandfather’s footsteps as a preacher and heads to Taulkinham to do some preaching of his own.

Hazel creates his own church: the Church without Christ. It is a church where “the deaf don’t hear, the blind don’t see, the lame don’t walk, the dumb don’t talk, and the dead stay that way.”

Hazel Motes is battling demons; demons from the war, demons from his Christian upbringing, and demons from his current situation. He does not fare much better in his return than he evidently fared in the war.

An unlikely ally, Enoch Emery believes he possesses wise blood that provides inborn knowledge to guide him through all of life’s quandaries. His wise blood directs him to help Motes by stealing a mummy from the zoo where he works.

A blind preacher/con man, Asa Hawks and his promiscuous 15-year-old daughter, Sabbath Lily taunt Motes who they believe is much more devout than his atheistic rantings would imply.

Quotes:

…but his eyes were what held her attention longest. Their settings were so deep that they seemed, to her, almost like passages leading somewhere and she leaned halfway across the space that separated the two seats, trying to see into them.

His black hat sat on his head with a careful, placed expression and his face had a fragile look as it if might have been broken and stuck together again, or like a gun no one knows is loaded.

…watching him with the kind of intensity that means something is going to happen no matter what is done to keep it from happening.

Not so sure I’d even want to meet with Ms. O’Connor after the recent allegations about her overt racism. Perhaps I’d first allow for some idle chatter regarding her writing process and then I’d have to get real and ask her where her hatred came from.

My (unbiased) rating for Wise Blood is a 9 out of 10.

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Next up, Franz Kafka’s The Trial…