2023 Book Review #40: Grand Opening

 

My sister Hope recommended this author to me. I had seen the books on the town library shelves before but for some reason had never taken them out.  I started with this one......he has many novels and my sister has read many of them. I hope to find some more by him. 

STORY SUMMARY

The Foster Family (Hank, Catherine, and their 12 year old son Brendan) are moving away from the city of Minneapolis to the small village of Plum. (There is no village of Plum in MN but there is a Plum Creek which is located in Walnut Grove  and where Laura Ingalls Wilder lived with her parents and siblings in the 1870s).  Catharine's father, known as Grandfather, is coming with them.  He is 80 years old and is at the beginning stages of dementia.  He used to be a brakeman on the railroad system. 

Hank and Catherine have bought out an old grocery market....in fact, they've invested all of their life savings into this store.....they plan on naming it Hank's Market once it's up and running. Brendan will begin the new school year the next day at his new junior high school because they moved on Labor Day. He is hoping to make some friends. It is 1944 and America is involved in World War II. 

The 4 people making up the Foster home find life in this small village to be rather disheartening. They discover that it is a very tightly knit community, with Catholics pitted against the Lutherans.  To the Fosters it is like living in a foreign country after living in a big city. Brendan feels very lonely and Catharine can't get over the divide between the Catholics and Lutherans. Hank is simply disgusted at the filth and squalor of the former grocery store.  He vows to do well and is putting all of his hopes on the Grand Opening of his market.  Catharine raises eyebrows among many of the townsfolk, particularly the women, as she not only is Hank's wife and mother to Brendan, but also Hank's partner in business.  Most of the women in Plum do not work or have careers. 

The Fosters believe their success in business will lead them to a secure place in the Plum community. But what they will soon find out is that their happiness will depend to a much greater extent on the friends....and enemies....they soon make among the villagers. 

One village young adult man is named Wallace Flint. He is a desperately needy person, and sees himself as their grocery clerk, since he was the previous owner's clerk and just assumes the Fosters will want him. He was a very smart student while in high school, but now at teh age of 25, appears to be very bitter and angry due to his life circumstances. He suffers from Epilepsy and his mother is very overprotective of him. In fact, he still lives at home with his mother. He sees in Catherine, a kind of kindred spirit.  Catherine, however, does not sense this in him at all.  He becomes very jealous of Brendan and his relationship with Catherine and Hank. He is somewhat  of a misfit. He actually becomes very evil. 

The other villager who is like a misfit, is a teen boy aged 15 whose name is Dodger Hicks. Dodger has been raised by a criminal father, who is often in prison, and in fact, is serving a sentence currently at the Stillwater prison.  His mother is an alcoholic and hangs out with all kinds of shady men.   Dodger is very physically and emotionally neglected. However, he is a very kind boy and becomes very drawn to Brendan, always hanging around Brendan and basically is known as Brendan's shadow. He becomes a member of the Foster family after a series of incidents and Wallace Flint is now jealous of Dodger. None of the neighbors like Dodger as he has been known to steal things just like his father. Dodger, however, lives out Jesus' 2nd greatest commandment well: to love our neighbors as ourselves. 

It is Dodger Hicks who creates in Brendan...and in the entire story....a dilemma of human existence:  How much do we owe to our brothers or sisters in need? Should we make sacrifices for people who are less fortunate than ourselves? 

Meanwhile, there is a dramatic climax to this family and town, all while the dramatic climax of WWII rages on in Europe and the Pacific......a lot of drama in this peaceful Minnesota farmland.  The war...and the story....end on the same day.  

What lessons will Brendan learn from this village and the people there, particularly Dodger?

MY THOUGHTS

I enjoyed this story even though parts of it were downright depressing and sad. I even felt frustration and anger at times at certain characters. It was also a bit too slow going for me, although the setting kind of alludes to that......it's like a warm molasses feeling at times, and at other times, like a cold splash of water in your face. 

The character development is rich.....you as the reader really come to know the personalities of the main characters (Hank, Catherine, Brendan, Dodger, Wallace, Grandfather, the Brasks and both ministers). 

I like that the story takes place in one year. I also like that the author included some facts about then President FD Roosevelt and the war. 

I wish I could tell you about the climax and my feelings towards it, but then it would ruin the story for you. I actually gasped and had tears in my eyes at the last couple of chapters. 

The overall themes in this story seem to be:  family relationships; friendships; bigotry;/implicit bias;  judgmentalism; bullying; physical and emotional neglect/abuse; mental illness; persistence; compassion; the moral coming of age; popularity; kindness; love; acceptance; single parenthood; alcoholism; good vs evil. 

There were a few quotes that jumped out at me.  Here are two of my favorites: 

"But was there no limit to the things God expected you to do for others? Didn't God ever let you off the hook? Didn't God realize that while helping Dodger learn to be normal, Brendan was in danger of becoming an outcast? " (pg 247, Grand Opening by Jon Hassler, c.1987)

"'For all we know, God might have sent Dodger on the same mission as His Son---to put us to the test, to bring us the message about loving one another to see how we reacted to it......my assurance that each time we fail to care for one another we carry out, one more time, the act of crucifixion.'" (pg 290)

In my opinion, this book is appropriate for ages 14 and older. 

On a scale of 1-10, with 10 being the highest, I rate this an 8.