Book Review: The Silence of Bonaventure Arrow

First, I must apologize. I thought my scheduled date was March 8, but I just realized it was the sixth. So, this is a day late - despite the fact that I had the review ready to go like a week ago.

The Story: Conceived in love and possibility, Bonaventure Arrow didn’t make a peep when he was born, and the doctor nearly took him for dead. No one knows that Bonaventure’s silence is filled with resonance—a miraculous gift of rarified hearing that encompasses the Universe of Every Single Sound. Growing up in the big house on Christopher Street in Bayou Cymbaline, Bonaventure can hear flowers grow, a thousand shades of blue, and the miniature tempests that rage inside raindrops. He can also hear the gentle voice of his father, William Arrow, shot dead before Bonaventure was born by a mysterious stranger known only as the Wanderer.

Bonaventure’s remarkable gift of listening promises salvation to the souls who love him: his beautiful young mother, Dancy, haunted by the death of her husband; his Grand-mère Letice, plagued by grief and a long-buried guilt she locks away in a chapel; and his father, William, whose roaming spirit must fix the wreckage of the past. With the help of Trinidad Prefontaine, a Creole housekeeper endowed with her own special gifts, Bonaventure will find the key to long-buried mysteries and soothe a chorus of family secrets clamoring to be healed.


My Thoughts: The Silence of Bonaventure Arrow by Rita Leganski is like Benjamin Button, haunting and curious and magical and fantastic. I was immediately taken in by the quiet majesty of Bonaventure, which is wonderfully mirrored in the language of the book. The emotions, both universal and personal, portrayed in the novel feel raw and honest.

Many times, especially today with my harried schedule, I speed through books. I can read rather fast and still manage to catch every word and feel satisfied when I have finished. This book, however, I savored, reading slowly and many times re-reading a particularly moving passage. Perhaps it was just the profound difference between this writing and the writing of the books I have recently been reading (primarily books focused more on action than style) but I was very much drawn to the way Leganski crafts the story.

Magical realism is quite the draw for me, and this book really delivers. Even though the novel is infused with southern spirituality, voodoo, ghosts, christianity, extraordinary abilities, and the such not, I never felt like we were in a different world; the characters, the setting, it all felt very real and possible.


On a side note, Leganski has a facebook page which is currently rather dedicated to this book, and I have to admit I was kind of fascinated by the updates about who's reading it, where it's at, and the such not.

A big thank you to TLC Book Tours for giving me the opportunity to read this one. And a big apology for getting it up late!