A Simple Elegant Story About Love

There have been many small towns that have been created in literature: Larry McMurtry's Thalia, James Wilcox's Tula Springs, Garrison Keilor's Lake Wobbegon Days. It's time to add another title to this list: Kent Haruf's Holt, Colorado.

Haruf writes about Holt in his wonderful novel, Plainsong. The book tells of different stories in this town, similar to how Mary McGarry Morris and Tom Bodett's writing. Haruf excellently weaves the stories with each other, creating a fine tapestry of believable, likable characters.
They do the everyday things; they go to work, school, they help calves being born, they collect for the newspaper. But so much is happening in their lives it creates a undercurrent in their day to day lives.

There's Guthrie, whose wife has taken not to get up in the morning and leaves him altoether; their sons Ike and Bobby who get into adventures around the town. Victoria, a teen girl who gets pregnant, yet it connects her to other people in the town and makes her less alone.

There are other characters in this novel, but I don't want to tell too much about them because the reader should discover them for themselves. What strikes me so much about the book is so many things: How they are all so lonely and trying to find love. How quiet their lives are, not quiet boring but quiet that when they have something to say, it means something. When something dramatic happens(Victoria's mother kicks Victoria out, Guthrie has trouble with a student) it does seem out of place, but just after it happens, they resume to their quiet lives.

Plainsong is not only an excellent look in an American town, it's a excellent look of America, period. Kudos to Kent Haruf for creating such a wonderful community.