Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, May 28, 1995 TAG: 9505300135
SECTION: BOOK PAGE: G-4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: REVIEWED BY MARIAN COURTNEY
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
With its lyrical narrative and short staccato chapters, Mary Gardner's second book, ``Milkweed,'' reads more like a long poem than a novel.
Gardner's style lends a surreal aura to the story of Susan, a young girl left orphaned by the inexplicable murder of both parents. The experience leads Susan to develop a self-sufficient individuality. She turns to books and learning, but before graduating leaves college to marry, becoming a Minnesota farm wife. During the pre-World War II era, after all, women were expected to be supportive helpmates, subjugating their personal growth and dreams for the family's sake. In Susan's case it backfires. She can play the role of subservient wife and mother for only so long, after which it begins to stifle her.
Her imperfect solution to her deepening dissatisfaction is to take her children and leave her uncomprehending husband behind. Ironically, a decision having such a profound effect on Susan and her family bestows neither happiness nor peace. She offers what solace she can to her confused daughter by saying, ``Women always go on, Mar. All of us You can love me or hate me or both. It's all right.''
All of the characters who people ``Milkweed'' seem emotionally impaired. Their lives pass like prison sentences. No one realizes it is the tiny, everyday joys that make the major and minor problems worthwhile.
Gardner follows Susan's evolution from dutiful farm wife to struggling single mother to grandmother as much as by what she omits as by what she includes. The novel has a dream-like quality, and the resulting suspense keeps readers turning the pages.
The book provides no answers. Despite human technological progress, Gardner says, each generation continues to suffer the same emotional traumas as the previous one. Humans get smarter, but not wiser. "Milkweed" is an imaginative work written with originality. It lifts readers out of their own reality and plops them into an earlier era, where answers were no easier to come by than they are now and where misunderstandings and the consequences of one's decisions are just as wrenching.
Marian Courtney lives in Charlottesville.
by CNB