Oyster: A Novel [Paperback]

Much feted for his debut collection of stories, The Torturer's Apprentice, Biguenet follows up with a steamy first novel set on the Louisiana coast. The Petitjeans and the Bruneaus are rival oyster fishing families in Plaquemines Parish in 1957, struggling to survive in an environment rapidly falling prey to petroleum companies and their ravaging of swamp and bayou ecosystems. As it gets more difficult to hang on economically, old families begin to slip. The Petitjean family, headed by Felix, has reluctantly turned to "Horse" Bruneau for a loan. Desperate for cash, Felix and his wife, Mathilde, approve Horse's plan to marry their daughter, Therese. Therese scotches that plan by luring Horse to the Petitjean property for a supposed midnight tryst, then murdering him. When Horse's body turns up in a trawler's net, his sons Darryl ("Little Horse") and Ross (with their gentler brother, Rusty, looking on in horror) murder Therese's brother, Alton, who they blame for Horse's murder since nobody even considers that a slip of a girl like Therese could kill the powerful Horse. Darryl has always hated Alton, anyway, suspecting (rightly, as it turns out) that Alton is his half brother the fruit of an affair between Mathilde and Horse. After the murder, Sheriff Christovich, an old beau of Mathilde's, manipulates Darryl into letting Rusty work for the Petitjeans, hoping Rusty will talk. But it is Therese who exacts vengeance on the Bruneau house with the implacability of a Plaquemines Lady Macbeth. While Biguenet makes the Bruneaus, except for Rusty, a bit too villainous and Therese a bit too clever for plausibility's sake, his debut satisfyingly penetrates the curtain of gumbo clich surrounding Cajun culture. (June) Forecast: Booksellers may expect to build handily on the success of The Torturer's Apprentice with this juicy follow-up and should certainly capitalize on the novel's regional appeal.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

The oyster-rich bayou country of Louisiana in the 1950s is the setting for this remarkable first novel by Biguenet, author of the O. Henry Award-winning collection of short stories The Torturer's Apprentice. The bitter family rivalry between the Bruneaus and the Petitjeans, deeply rooted in their entangled past, leads to tragedy from the outset. A marriage arranged between young Therese Petitjean and the Bruneau patriarch to shore up the Petitjeans' finances ends violently in the first chapter, and matters don't improve from there. Day-to-day life for the oyster fishermen of the period is realistically portrayed as this tale of two doomed families unfolds. Colorful characters and a story line that rips along make this work captivating from start to finish. Comparisons to Faulkner might be a stretch, but Biguenet's steamy Southern flavor is memorable. Recommended for most fiction collections. Ann H. Fisher, Radford P.L., VA
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.