2008 Woodie Awards
Morris' "Songs" is anything but ordinary
Brynna Geisler-Locke
Issue date: 5/6/08 Section: Arts and Entertainment
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At SSU, students come from a variety of places, including big cities, posh suburbs, and small towns. It is this last category that we learn to understand in Mary McGarry Morris's novel, "Songs in Ordinary Time."
This book is set in a small Vermont town during the summer of 1960. This is a time of revolution in the nation, and this town feels it as strongly as anywhere else.
The Fermoyle family is the main focus of "Songs in Ordinary Time." The mother, Marie, is an incredibly hard woman who raised her three children on her own.
She is pitiless towards weakness in herself and others. She has put every fiber of herself into her family, even when it is clearly too much for her to handle.
Sam, the patriarch of the Fermoyle clan, is a drunk. He hasn't lived with the family for a number of years.
Only when he's been drinking does he crave the love of his family. He has a good heart, but he cannot be the father that his family needs. He is feared, and when his children see him on the street they avoid him.
Alice is the oldest Fermoyle child. She is quiet, obedient and tries not to make any more trouble for the family than they already have. She has just graduated high school and is trying to help her family make ends meet before she goes to college in the fall.
Norm is next in line. He is a teenager dealing with the customary accompanying angst.
However, he also must deal with an angry and poor mother, as well as his drunken father, all while trying to be the man of the house.
Benjy is the youngest Fermoyle. He is twelve years old, and is quiet and misunderstood. He doesn't have any friends his own age, and is too young to hang out with his siblings.
He so badly wants his mother to be happy that even when a mysterious stranger comes to town and moves in with the Fermoyles, he doesn't mention it to anyone.
Omar Duvall is a scam artist, presenting himself to society as a traveling salesman. As the book opens we read about his struggle over money with a wronged business partner. The partner ends up stabbed and left for dead.
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