There is something inherently special about a story that leaves an especially lasting impact. Any novel can be entertaining, cry-inducing or engrossing, at least until the last page. Those novels that stick with you have a nuance of literary resiliency that demands the solid foundation of history and characters that share tradition and, if not values, at the very least a past.
These stories invite you to share in worlds that have a sense of immortality that can’t be trapped between the covers. They are psychologically intricate, as the long-lasting impacts of emotional and physical struggles must be transcribed from generation to generation of characters.
Although it spans significantly fewer years than more ambitious novels, Louisa May Alcott’s “Little Women” was my first exposure to this kind of complex structure and is still one of my personal favorites. Admittedly, I think it’s technically designated as a children’s book (I did get it as a present for my eighth birthday) but it still managed to captivate both Joey and Rachel on “Friends,” and I revisit the March family every Christmas.
What’s so fundamentally enchanting about these books is that they can be constantly revisited due to their hefty casts of characters and multi-decade (or century) spans. You find something new each time you return to them.
Compare “100 Years of Solitude” by Gabriel García Márquez, with its magical realism, inherently flawed characters and alternately blessed and cursed town of Macondo, to the relatively simple lives of Beth, Amy, Jo and Meg. Hometown to the Buendía family, it is the setting for the drama of many generations of Buendías. “Solitude” is a beautiful book, although wild and definitely not for everyone’s taste. Buzzfeed ranked it one of the most difficult novels to read, mostly because every character has the exact same name. This ends up being a self-fulfilling prophecy — as the same mistakes and foibles are repeated for one hundred years.
“100 Years of Solitude” doesn’t have a formal protagonist, rather, each chapter usually has a different main character because a lot of people die, which almost gives it a historical feel as opposed to a fictional one. The attempt to conform Macondo into man’s image of what it should be and the repetitive nature of history makes for an impressive literary feat, one that is merely bolstered by the multi-generational scope.
But for those who aren’t in the mood for tackling García Márquez, Colleen McCullough’s “TheThornbirds” is in the same vein while being a bit easier to digest. Set primarily in Drogheda, a sheep station in Australia, the admittedly dense novel spans from the childhood of Meggie Cleary, the only daughter in a large family, to the adulthood of her children, along with sporadic flashbacks to the back stories of her parents, Paddy and Fee. It’s primarily a love story — Meggie and a priest end up having a thing for each other — but it also explicates the impact of parental styles and relationships on the children. Meggie’s brothers, who grow up isolated on Drogheda, never leave their hometown.Meggie’s daughter delves into tumultuous romantic relationships after never seeing a healthy one modeled.
“The Twelve Tribes of Hattie” by Ayana Mathis comes across as a modern reworking of “The Thornbirds.” It tells the story of Hattie Shepherd, who fled from the South in 1923 and settled in Philadelphia to pursue the American Dream during the Great Migration. She marries a man who only brings her disappointment and twelve children, although any loving maternal feelings seem to dissolve.
The book, which is surprisingly short for a story that spans so many years, jumps across decades, letting the reader’s imagination fill in the various breaks. Yet the ripple effect on her children caused by Hattie’s lack of attention is obvious — there is a gay musician forced to hide his sexuality, a pill-dependent housewife and a mother suffering from extreme mental illness. Some chapters are painful to tackle, Mathis’ characters are so emotionally multi-faceted that she has frequently been compared to Toni Morrison. And if that doesn’t convince you to read it, Oprah also gave it her official book club stamp of approval.
Kim Bussing is a sophomore in the College. TOP SHELF appears every other Friday in the guide.
