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September Dawn
By Carole Whang Schutter
ISBN-10: 1434300226
ISBN-13: 978-1434300225
To be very honest and to the point, this novel quite haunted me. I found the entire piece of history being covered in the work to be morbidly fascinating. I was drawn to the end like a magnet even though I knew before I opened the first page what the outcome would be.
Did the book have weaknesses? I believe it did. Many times, especially when the narrative is brought into the modern day scenes of the novel I felt like the book was either written for an evangelical Christian audience or that there was an assumption made from the author’s side that all of the readership is coming from this same point of view. Also there are places where I felt that the narrative was pushed along a bit and especially too forced when trying to drive several of the author’s points home. For instance, when the final massacre was taking place the author often gave full names and ages and family relationships which to me seemed quite out of place. It made the narrative seem a bit too unreal for my comfort. I could see what Ms. Schutter was trying to do; to drive home that these were real people who were killed in the book, but at the same time I feel like it actually took away from the flow of the action.
Carole Whang Schutter did not cut the Mormon Church any slack in her vivid portrayal of their history. She told the story from Joseph Smith’s childhood up until the Mormons had arrived in Utah in fairly poignant detail. At best she painted the LDS’s followers as simple folk who were looking for acceptance and a place to belong, but as with any cult or fraud religion, these people misled by charlatans all along the way. The leadership of the Latter Day Saints were tarred and feathered by this book, having been indicted as schemers who would stop at nothing to achieve their selfish and often paranoid demands. They took their followers’ property, their wives, fiancées, etc., and had those who dared to speak up or speak out excommunicated, executed and even castrated. Ms. Schutter minced no words here.
And in the midst of it all we have an ill fated love story… These were two innocents who unwittingly but willingly fell into love at first sight – a love that would be doomed as much by their backgrounds as the tragic events yet to unfold. The two young lovers, Jonathan, son of a local Mormon Bishop, and the young Emily, daughter of a minister in the doomed wagon train trying to make their way to California, would be caught in a crossfire of retribution for past wrongs against the Mormons in Missouri and Arkansas as well as the Mormon resistance of Federal authority in their desert regions. Having only read the book and not having seen the film I assume that this is the main story being told, but I believe that with all of the historical background added to the novel, there is actually a dual plot in the book – that of the fate of the two lovers and that of the history of the Mormon Church. In an odd way, the events leading to the actual massacre could be described as a subplot.
The aforementioned weaknesses of the book I believe could be put down as the birth of a novel from a screenplay rather than the other way around, which is more usual, but I believe that the plot is strong enough and the history behind the story is compelling enough that this is still a good, interesting read.
Gary Dale Cearley’s Reviews on BookPleasures.com |
