The Beans of Egypt, Maine

I have gotten 115 pages in and I cannot go any further. I simply cannot understand the praise for this book. After reading nearly half of this novel, a single plot has yet to develop. Half a novel of character development? Possibly an entire novel of character development, I'll never know. Overly descriptive dreck. Eight pages to describe the neighbor helping to jump start a car? I hate putting a book down halfway through, but reading this book is torture.

I wonder if I should be even thinking of reviewing this book, given that I have had the very good fortune of being friends with the author for over 20 years now -- we met before "Beans" was published. However, I also feel that somebody out there should understand that this is a wonderful, honest, painful, loving, remarkable book. Carolyn writes about things she knows, and then gets very up close and personal about it. This book is an attempt to show those who have never known [or even seen] the lives of people some would term "unfortunate" and others simply disdain, and to show that THESE PEOPLE ARE PEOPLE JUST LIKE EVERYBODY ELSE. Being poor does not mean that one cannot live with dignity, or honesty, or humor. Being poor does mean that these people are often forced to live in a society that demeans them, insults them, and often forces them into places where they are regarded as nothing but yesterday's garbage. Let there be no mistake; The Beans are with us, and are not about to go away anytime soon, nor should they. If we have eyes to read and lips to read aloud the story of The Beans, we just might realize that they have much to teach us about truth, honor, respect, and love. I understand that many people will not understand how on earth I can make this statement because I understand that many people prefer to look for the tawdry and speciousness in environments that they find uncomfortable or even unbelievable. But this is above all a book of hope. It shows us that everyone lives a life of worth and influence, even if at times some of these "everyones" live lives that are in large part cruel and uncaring. And in that is the challenge of this book; to look below the surface and to see that all of us are part of the Bean family, and that we should value that relationship. This book is an amazing literary achievement, and this is a statement that I never make lightly -- even if the author happens to be a friend. So read it and try to let its power and honesty confer those qualities in abundance in your lives. You may not find them in your first reading of the book, but trust me -- they're there.

You just know that this life was lived before it was written about, and that's a hard fact to swallow. The writing is brilliant, and that makes it doubly incredible that someone with this hard-scrabble background could achieve this feat. The Beans are representative of the generally unwashed and usually uneducated extended families that populate every part of our country. They are the invisible, the uncounted, the unaccepted.Carolyn Chute is definitely an odd bird, but this book deserves to be read and re-read by anyone with an ounce of human kindness in his/her veins.

For years I have used this book to give a little reality check to students considering direct service work in the human services world. Do they see themselves as open and accepting of so alien a culture? Are they prepared to work with families like the Beans by looking for strengths on which to build? The Beans are everywhere: in rural Maine, the Ozarks, the Oklahoma panhandle and the dreary delta of the Mississippi. They have trailer towns full of the Beans in Idaho and Michigan.They are overlooked because we do not want to see their shacks as we drive down our road, or hear their dogs howling in the cold of long winter nights. To see them is to acknowledge that they have carved out a lifestyle from the underbelly of ours, and that they breed and prosper. And sometimes even have dignity and rights.

This is a totally unexpected literary treat. Written with an clear, earthy feel for the characters' ever-revloving entrampment in their culture and destinies, Ms. Chute creates an indelible picture of destitute life in the backwoods of Maine. The writing is creative and well-crafted enticing the reader to boldly view the borderless and interwoven lives of these subjects. This is reading on a par with "The Grapes of Wrath".

Many years ago, I had to read this book when I began working for our local Legal Aid Society. It's amazing to me how "The Book of Ruth" got so much publicity when this book did a much better job of detailing the desperate lives of people living in poverty.I write reviews for a local newspaper and when "Ruth" came out, I reviewed it, mentioning this book. Several readers called to tell me they read this book instead of "Ruth" and to express their gratitude for my recommendation.If you need to look into the eye of abject poverty, forget Oprah's suggestion. Read this book.