So Long, See You Tomorrow

Maxwell has always been known as a very pure writer - honest sentiments in concrete images. Take this line from 'So Long, See You Tomorrow' about children sleeping in a quiet winter night as an example: 'sleeping the sleep of stone'. Same for the book on the whole: a straight-forward and concise record of a painful childhood + a convincing and sympathetic account of what could have happened in the tragic murder/suicide that took place in the book. In the pages depicting Maxwell's childhood, you see images of the child agonizing over the death of his mother, the loss of a normal childhood, the bitterness against his father and a mixture of all these unresolved feelings which the grown up narrator narrates with great immediacy. The pictures are particularly heart-breaking as the writing is very subdued - everything is described for what it is and the author, while expressing his feelings directly, simply state what he feels without exaggeration. It is the kind of autobiographical writing that makes you understand why one writes autobiography and why all of us grieve over certain things that we think we've let go, or constantly hope we'll let go: some things will always be there, down deep, once they happen. The fictional account of the murder/tragedy echoes Maxwell's story: how everyone has a heart and a right to their feelings; how we all get trapped in situations we cant control and break someone's heart or gets heart-broken. In a way, writing this story seems to be a way of coming to terms with things for Maxwell- to get over the bitterness against things gone wrong by understanding the complexities and inevitability of some situations. One striking thing about this piece of writing is that it's highly dialogic: like in the universe in Anna Karenina, everyone in this fictional world has a right to be understood. There's a reason why someone becomes the person s/he's become and why s/he's done what s/he's done. Even the most unsympathetic story (on the surface) has his story that may be sadder than everyone else's. In the end it's an extremely well-written work - a very good example for students of creative writing in particular. The last thing I'll say about this book is its title. A line from the dialogue in the book itself, it symbolizes that line between childhood and adolescence/adulthood (when one's forced to drastically grow up in an extreme circumstance). One crosses this line and enters the world of traumatic loss, in which we have no choice but to accept and endure pain. As wound souls we forever look back at that other carefree world with nostaglia - a brilliant title and immensely geniune emotions.

This is an excellent and engrossing novel that will captivate and draw you right into the story. On an early winter morning just before daybreak, three men hear a loud noise similar to a car backfiring. At first they dismiss it as just that, but it turns out to be a fatal shot that kills a farmer named Lloyd Wilson. The protagonist in the story was friends with the deceased man's son, Cletus. Using newspaper clippings, memories, and imagination, he tries to reconstruct the dramatic events that led to the shooting. Through the use of imagery, William Maxwell creates a story that is vivid in its depictions of rural life and the excruciating emotions people endure as a result of choices they make. This book takes the reader on a journey where one feels like a part of the world these people inhabit. The descriptive and evocative writing helps us to understand their pain and anxiety as we watch them live their lives. This is a terrific book and a great introduction to the literary talents of William Maxwell. Highly recommended!

In reading William Maxwell's So Long, See You Tomorrow, I realized a few things. First of all, in my limited experience, I have yet to see a book which fulfills both its role as a novel as well as a vehicle for some conveyance by the author better than this one. Second, I realized that my review of this novel will be glowing and perhaps superfluously positive. Take this only as an extremely strong recommendation to read this book and not as an indication that I am a little crazy. The novel is an apology from the narrator to a boy from his childhood. The two were friends in the early 20th century Midwest, only to have this friendship shattered by the murder of one boy's father. The story of what happens to the boys after this event, and the feelings that the narrator must carry with him, are the basis for his need to apologize to his childhood friend, as well as the basis for a superbly written novel. William Maxwell uses narrative effortlessly. His flashbacks, flash forwards, and imaginations blend so seamlessly into the rest of the story that the reader is able to weave them into the plot with no difficulty. He wastes no words, and spends little time on description. Now I have heard people rave about novels because the author describes rural Montana so well, of gives such an accurate description of the ocean, but let me tell you that a novel like Maxwell's awards itself a much higher place in my literary hall of fame for not needing such description, which is often beautiful but seldom integral to the plot or theme. Instead he uses his words to describe the actions of the characters in the story, which in turn reveals much about them, which illuminates the different themes of the novel excellently. Maxwell uses his novel to a degree that most writers don't. That is to say that it was written almost entirely for one person. As I said, I have a relatively small catalogue from which to reference, but it seems to be the most specifically intended novel that I have seen. Some may view this as a negative, but it my mind, it draws the reader along the narrative, if for no other reason than to see how the narrator will form the finale of his apology. You want to see how he leaves it with this person who he admittedly knows will probably never see the novel. It is not my place to say how this takes place, but I will say that, in a novel of only about 130 pages, William Maxwell has ample room to fulfill his purpose, as well as the novel's literary purpose. I feel this is a great testament to the author, and his writing. I have always been of the school that if Moby Dick could be written in ten pages, it should be. Extraneous material in a novel, no matter how beautifully written, does little more than offer the reader that which he does not need. Maxwell's book avoids this, and in the process becomes one of the finest novels I have ever read.

This is an almost perfect short novel: concise, well written, and immensely touching. The adult situation it recounts could have become melodramatic, but the book makes it genuinely tragic by showing its effects on the two boys on the periphery. The narrator's adult regret for the effects of his childhood thoughtlessness is very true to life too -- we've all been there! -- and I found that the book echoed in my mind long after I put it down. I feel that this is an underappreciated masterpiece that deserves to be much better known.

This is my favorite book, by my favorite author. I could read it again and again have! It is his most cleanly drawn and tightly written work. Not a word more or less would perfect it. The story continues the exploration begun in "They Came Like Swallows", following the life of a sensitive middle child after the death of his mother during the great influenza epidemic of 1918. It questions the meaning of friendship, of love and consequences of passion. The child, who certainly seems to possess something of Maxwell himself, traces even into old age, the true meaning of relationships he formed at this period of his life. The end of the book is truly haunting and will stay with you for years. It speaks volumes about how the words that are unspoken in life are sometimes much more important than those that are spoken. How as we grow old, we remember all the things that we could have, should have said....Maxwell is truly one of our finest writers, underappreciated due in large part to his elegant restraint. His prose is as austere as it is powerful. It is truly an unforgettable novel.