The Challenge Factory discussion

Reading Schedule (with many thanks to Agnieszka for looking at the structure of the book to see what appropriate cut-offs would be)

Week 1: chapters 1 - 5
Week 2: chapters 6 - 10
Week 3: chapters 11 - 13
Week 4: chapters 14 - 18

This group read will be handled as an open discussion. Please feel free to post any comments you may have as you read along - being sure to hide comments in spoiler tags if you read ahead of the posted schedule.

I am reading this book now. I'll take notes so I won't comment ahead of time. I'm very interested in what people think of this book.

I started yesterday. So far so good, although I've cringed a few places at poor editing (beyond just vernacular language use). It always makes me mad for authors when they don't get better editing.

Erica wrote: "I started yesterday. So far so good, although I've cringed a few places at poor editing (beyond just vernacular language use). It always makes me mad for authors when they don't get better editing."

Good to know and I’m on the same page.

I'm through chapter 5. (view spoiler)[The story is developing slowly for me and I'm struggling to care about the characters. The editing continues like nails on a chalkboard: staring for starting, whaling for wailing, two small verbs left in where one clearly should have been dropped - as though the author were deciding between the two but then never decided. It takes away from the story, unfortunately. (hide spoiler)]

Reading ahead because we'll be out of town. Done through chapter 10. (view spoiler)[I remember when Hurricane Katrina hit and what a disaster it was. The author brings home the pain, stench, fear and desperation of the people struggling to get out of the severely flooded wards and then later the Superdome. It is a national disgrace that these people were treated so poorly. (hide spoiler)]

Have fun and enjoy the time with your mother!

Thanks! Really looking forward to it!!

I just finished chapter 5 and have very mixed feelings. Partially Louis appears to be very mature for his age, then he acts in a way I’d like to shout to grow up - though I suppose that’s pretty normal for a young adult in general.
This is the second book within a week that showed how big the cultural differences are between middle Europeans and people of African descent (even partial) and I struggle to wrap my mind around.
I’m not sure I got characters straight as the way he tells the story is a bit confusing. I suppose Paw Paw is his (deceased) grandfather though it sounds like Pops could be as much another grandfather as his dad/daddy/father. I don’t remember ever encountering one character using so many different names for a parent/father.
For the last couple chapters I was confused why there were so many contradictory statements about the location of his father - this entire part of the story seemed completely off but now makes sense - at least if we don’t get another description of the truth later on.

Before I read Salvage the Bones about a year ago hurricane Katrina wasn’t a real thing to me - at least nothing more than a news line, so I was looking forward to read a bit more about it and how it was possible it had such devastating consequences.
Knowing what will happen makes the following two quotes even more heartbreaking:
“You been through one hurricane, you been through ‘em all.” (p. 31)
As far as I knew, no one was taking the storm serious. Hurricanes in the south were like snow storms in the north; it was just something we grew up with so it wasn’t a big deal. We looked at evacuation as vacation instead of a cautionary procedure. (p. 66)

I would be very interested to learn how any of you who experienced it closer regard the events. Are the descriptions realistic? Did people really take the warnings so light? I’ve read about Katrina a bit online in the last year and remember mentions of lacking warnings/downplayed danger? Was it really so or is this once again another example how much (or in this case how little) you can trust anything online?

Erica wrote: "I'm through chapter 5. [spoilers removed]"

I agree. I expected by now to at least be at the point of the hurricane/its early stages.
I’m wondering about the two best friends, why are they mentioned so often if they stay so much in the background.

I just read the next five chapters and have still mixed feelings.
Up until the day of the storm the story meandered without purpose with a strange finale during the last night before. Then bam, we’re middle within, bam, it’s nine days later and that was it?!?

As usual I struggled with the paranormal elements though could deal with them way better than Monroe’s past trauma (view spoiler)[that really made me wish once again for mandatory castration of this kind of men (hide spoiler)]

If it were not for the fact finishing this book will give our team bonus points (Monster Round Up challenge) I doubt I would have made it this far, far less finish it :-( So I really hope it will get better in the second half.

Erica wrote: "Reading ahead because we'll be out of town. Done through chapter 10. [spoilers removed]"

Thank you for this glimpse into the reality of that disaster.
I was wondering how it was possible the emergency services didn’t help. I understand how they would say not to expect (fast) help if people refused to evacuate. Not to help even if it was obviously expected too many would stay and providing no water or food in the Dome where those without the financial means to evacuate were asked to go is hardcore cruelty in my opinion. Though it’s possible I see it this way because it’s something unimaginable in Germany.

It was horrifying when this disaster unfolded. Sadly, I think race/class distinctions really played a role in why people were left in such inhuman conditions. President Bush could have done a lot more to mobilize appropriate resources to aid the many thousands of people who were displaced and left to starve and often die. It is a national disgrace.
I finished the book, but like you I probably wouldn't have if it weren't for this and other challenges.

I my opinion the first three or so and the last couple chapters were worth reading and I even enjoyed them (despite the poor editing) the reminder was just slogging through.

Regarding the language several times I had the impression the grammar and poor wording were on purpose - I’ve encountered those speech patterns previously in southern (African American) book settings, at least the English ones; the Cajun looked a lot like a very simplified/flawed version of French. If I remember correctly something I read about displaced (mostly poor) Canadians from Acadia to southern Louisiana that would make a lot of sense.