In The Lake of The Woods

Tim O’Brien’s In The Lake of The Woods is a shattered story about a shattered man. Our hero/antihero/villain, John Wade, is confronting the latest of a litany of traumas: the loss of his wife, Kathy. How she died–and whether John played a role–is unclear to everyone, including him. But this story is far from a run-of-the-mill thriller; it’s a complex fable of damage and disintegration. O’Brien switches between various times and places in order to build his plot. We see the rise and fall of a politician’s marriage, the quiet misery in John’s childhood, a search for Kathy that brings out painful emotions from family and strangers alike. Most intense of all, however, is John’s memories of his past tour in Vietnam, where he encountered Nazi-level atrocities at My Lai. Filling in the cracks are gatherings of “evidence,” which ranges from fictional statements from the less important characters to quotes from the nonfiction on which O’Brien builds his story. There is little resolution here, but there is beauty. The author has spun a lush, well-written web that readers can’t help being snared in. You’ll what he has to show you, but In The Lake of The Woods is worth it.