Philipp Meyer’s most recent novel, The Son, is a multi-generational saga documents the breaking of the American West. The country is violent–Comanches take scalps, settlers murder their neighbors, Mexicans are pushed from their land, children are kidnapped; the land is washed in blood.
The novel follows three narrators–Colonel Eli McCullough, a character of mythological proportions, his more reserved son, and his great-granddaughter.
Meyers plumbs our American mythology–the spirit of a people pushing upwards. But what is captivating in Eli McCullough–the boy stolen from his own family and raised as a Comanche, surviving only to watch those he loves caught in the cross-fire of the battle for land–is weakened by the ease of life later on. His son is more compassionate and the voice of reason, yes, but he is incapable of taking action.
Reading The Son, I was reminded of Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead. Meyers does not write as politically as Rand–his voice is notably absent from the novel–but their books share strong characters that live outside morality. They are fallen characters whose faults are also their successes.
It was prophesied I would live to see one hundred and having achieved that age I see no reason to doubt it. I am not dying a Christian though my scalp is intact and if there is an eternal hunting ground, that is where I am headed. That or the river Styx. My opinion at this moment is my life has been far too short: the good I could do if given another year on my feet. Instead I am strapped to this bed, fouling myself like an infant.
The Son is this month’s First Edition Club pick. Philipp Meyer will be here June 26th at 5 PM to sign and read.
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