Ruzz's Reviews > Three Day Road

I found Three Day Road when a notoriously late friend was more than an hour late to meet me and I had time to browse a local bookstore. I didn't pick the book up that day, but i noted it.

Later, while near the bookstore I went back in and grabbed it. The idea of the book crossed a number of vectors of interest for me. War history (wait, don't stop reading yet), snipers (please, keep reading), and early 20th century Natives.

I expected it to at least titillate my love of snipers, and war and the romantic ideal of Canada's native people.

What happened in fact is I was reminded that the medium of the novel is meant for many things, but of all those things, first is and always will be story-telling.

There are always messages, and lessons, and commentary in all human thought, and likely all stories. But its so easy to become consumed by the desire to share an ideal, an idea, a view of the world--we lose sight of the greater need.

That greater need is to be captivated, carried, led into another world entirely. To be entertained and touched. To be free of our reality and it's annoyances, stresses and even sometimes joys. And, in very rare cases, we need to find a safe place to feel more fully than the concrete world might permit.

And it is through great story-telling we are reminded how we can love characters in books. Be stirred and impassioned by simple words. be felt fully human-confusingly-through our emotional range and capacity to feel.

This book while not the benchmark upon which to measure storytelling, was still strong enough to remind me of this need. It's the first book I can recall in some time where I could turn off my analytical mind and just go with the characters.

perhaps the last was A Fine Balance.

Even if you care nothing for war history, snipers, or native idealism you should read this book for its great characters and ability to bring you somewhere else for 400 pages.