Hillbilly Elegy / Where the Crawdads Sing / Shuggie Bain 3 Books Collection Set by J.D. Vance

Hillbilly Elegy / Where the Crawdads Sing / Shuggie Bain 3 Books Collection Set Reviews

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  Paul Bryant

  At the moment there is a block on all new ratings & reviews of Hillbilly Elegy because of what GR has decided is "suspicious activity" - allegedly a "review bomb" where people are organised to submit hundreds of one or five star reviews, depending, because of something the author did or said. But there isn't a block on this combined book, so here's my Hillbilly Elegy review. (This is what's known as a work-around.)
  
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  HILLBILLY ELEGY by JD VANCE
  
  
  1) When JD Vance was chosen as Trump’s Veep I thought – wait, where have I heard that name, didn’t this guy write a book, which was some kind of famous? Well yes, he did, so I thought now I have to read it.
  
  2) It’s the story about how occasionally one unusual hillbilly can become upwardly mobile and go to college and then Yale and make something of himself and have a stable marriage and stable kids and just live the American Dream whereas 99% of his childhood pals will be strung out on opioids with three illegitimate kids from three different mothers – you know the cliches. They’re in a thousand tv shows and movies. I thought : this book is not well written, his voice is flat, he generalises, even in the midst of the overdoses and incarcerations; but he was only 30 when he wrote it, so give the guy a break.
  
  3) If there’s one thing this book is about, it’s the hillbillies dreadful self-destructiveness. According to JD, every day they live in a war zone of their own making, each family hates each other and all their neighbours with gusto, venom and a loony recklessness that takes no heed of any consequences, they were all born with one layer of skin missing, they all have hair-trigger volcanic tempers, they are really scary. Especially Mamaw, the grandmother. This leads to continual chaos in their lives, revolving doors of bad boyfriends, absent fathers, blah blah. There is probably nothing in this book about hillbillies that will surprise you. Except this :
  
  4) In the middle of the Bible Belt, active church attendance is actually quite low. He says all the polls are wrong – hillbillies will always say they go to church regularly, but they are not telling the truth. And although they all fervently say they are Christians what they mean by that is some weird hodgepodge of bits and pieces which they add to and discard at will. This is what Roger Olson is talking about when he says that in parts of the USA Christianity is becoming a “folk religion”.
  
  5) Can anything be done about this nightmare life-destroying culture? JD Vance says : no. The only thing you can possibly do is have a great supporting fierce Mamaw like he did and leave your hometown as soon as possible. He says
  
  I don’t know what the answer is, precisely, but I know it starts when we stop blaming Obama or Bush or faceless companies and ask ourselves what we can do to make things better.
  
  (But my guess is from here until November JD will be telling everyone who will listen that all America’s problems can be blamed on that disastrous worst president ever Joe Biden and his veep. )
  
  
  6) When he gets to Yale Law School it becomes oppressively self-congratulatory and very dull. When I think today about my life and how genuinely incredible it is – a gorgeous, kind, brilliant life partner; the financial security that I dreamed about as a child; great friends and exciting new experiences – I feel overwhelming appreciation for these United States.
  
  
  7) Online articles like one from Politico have gleefully dug up all JD’s past Trump-hating comments, like :
  
  “I’m a Never Trump guy,” Vance said in an interview with Charlie Rose in 2016, a clip used in both the new ads. “I never liked him.”
  
  Since then, things have changed. We can imagine him ducking into a phone box and re-emerging as an Always Trump guy. He’s apologised. Heck, we all of us say silly things now and then.
  
  8) The theory goes like this : Trump wins in November – in 2028 vice president JD Vance becomes the Republican nominee; he picks Donald Trump Jr as his VP; he wins the elections in 2028 and 2032; in 2036 Donald Trump Jr becomes the Republican nominee and wins the next two elections. Many a truth is spoken in jest!
  
  Rating : 2.5 stars - a pretty interesting read but also a pretty repetetetititive one.
  
  FURTHER READING (AND ALL LOADS BETTER THAN JD VANCE)
  
  Educated : Tara Westover
  American Rust : Philipp Meyer
  A Childhood : Harry Crews
  Mostly Redneck : Rusty Barnes
  Trash : Dorothy Allison
  Knockemstiff : Donald Ray Pollock
  American Death Songs : Jordan Harper
  Demon Copperhead : Barbara Kingsolver