Was It Beautiful? by Alison McGhee
#74 in my book challenge for the year, Was It Beautiful? by Minnesotan writer Alison McGhee, was, in fact, startlingly beautiful. I put off reading this book for a long time because I was afraid it was too sad. I based this on my readings of her two previous books, Rainlight and Shadow Baby, both of which were wildly lovely and terrifically sad. This one was supposed to be even more sad, and I wasn’t sure I could cope. I should have trusted the writer.
Was It Beautiful? is the story of William T. Jones, a formerly happy man who has lost his son, his wife, and his cat to various forces in a short time. Unsurprisingly, William T. is no longer happy. But how he copes and how his story unfolds is mesmerizing. In the end his suffering, and that of those around him, is redeemed. Crystal, a chararacter from Rainlight, gets an increasingly significant role in this book, and I was pleased that Crystal got her share of redemption as well. McGhee’s characters are so good it’s almost scary. They’re like warm tapestries that I want to draw around me and snuggle into on a cold night.