Sweet Hereafter by Russell Banks

¶ … Sweet Hereafter by Russell Banks. Specifically, it will contain a review of book, while convincing a reader why he or she should read the book or ignore it. "The Sweet Hereafter" is a disturbing and enlightening book about the spirit and will of a New England town touched by a tragic accident. THE SWEET HEREAFTER Russell Banks' "The Sweet Hereafter" is not an easy book to read, or put down.

It is not a happy story, and yet somehow, the characters grow on the reader, making it difficult to forget them after the book is back on the shelf. The story opens with the tragic crash of a school bus that kills fourteen children. The rest of the story deals with the aftermath of the crash, and how a small New England town deals with the tragedy.

Nearly everyone in the town of Sam Dent is affected, and the novel is told from four different character's perspectives, each affected in a different way. This is an important and meaningful book because it deals not only with tragedy, but the aftermath of tragedy, when the living have to go on living, just like Nichole Burnell, a teenager who was on the bus and has to live the rest of her life paralyzed in a wheelchair.

Perhaps that is one reason this book is so disturbing - it shows life as it really is, rather than glossing over the tragic events of the crash and how they affect the town from then on. It is difficult to read about the vulture like lawyers who descend on the town after the crash, hoping to find "deep pocket" defendants to sue.

Many of the townsfolk see through the avaricious lawyers, including the pathetic alcoholic Billy Ansel, the father of twins killed in the accident, who realizes "there'll be all kinds of appeals, and I'll be tangled up in this mess for the next five years... This thing is never going to go away" (Banks 194). Indeed, for many "this thing" will never go away, and the novel makes that clear.

It also makes it clear these are tough New Englanders, who can carry their pain with them, even as they gradually attempt to put it behind them. The last scene at the annual demolition derby is part ghastly, as the entire town seems to relive an automotive bashing similar to the bus crash, which helps cleanse them in its own grisly way. It is difficult to think this novel could be any more like real life.

The characters are all real people with real problems, from paralyzed Nicole, to Dolores, the bus driver who must live with her own demons, to Billy, the alcoholic father of two dead girls. The reader is prepared to like the people who have suffered so much, and dislike the seemingly greedy lawyer, Mitchell Stephens, and yet each character has their own charm, their own problems, and adds to the overall strength of the story.

In an unexpected twist, Nicole, for very personal reasons, thwarts the legal processing by blaming the accident totally on Dolores and excessive speed. The "deep pockets" defendants are spared, and the town gets on with life, minus the big settlements the lawyers had so quickly promised. The novel is realistic in its details, and realistic in the very different people it portrays. This is truly real.