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"The Wellbaby" by Zack Grenville

As a native Oklahoman, I'm always interested in good fiction or non-fiction books that use my native state as its setting.
I stumbled upon the web site for this Kindle-only book when I was doing a search for Oklahoma fiction. I don't have a Kindle, but after reading the sample chapters on Amazon and the book's web site I borrowed a friend's Kindle so I could read the whole thing.

I'm glad I did. While certainly not National Book Award material, The Wellbaby is the most realistic southwestern-themed novel I've read in a long time, with one of the most appealing female heroines I've ever encountered in a contemporary fiction novel.

In 1971, ten month old Amanda Prahl falls down a well in the small oil town of Iron Lake, Oklahoma. Her life hangs in the balance as the army digs a rescue hole alongside the well that will allow a rescuer to dig a tunnel between the wells to bring the baby to safety. This event captures the attention of the nation for 12 hours, until Amanda is rescued by Floyd Smoll, a journeyman painter and part-time volunteer fireman.

Without getting in details, in spite of this happy outcome, neither Amanda or Floyd live happily ever after. Over the next 17 years, Amanda's family sinks into poverty, her father dies, and her alcoholic mother abandons her to the custody of a foster home. At age 15, she arranges to live on her own in the family's vacated trailer home, where she quits school and becomes a waitress at a local diner.

Meanwhile, Floyd wins the heart of a local teenage girl and marries her in a joyless shotgun wedding after she becomes pregnant. After ten years of a loveless marriage, she leaves him for another man, taking their 8-year old daughter with her. Floyd find solace in drinking and his job as a shirt-assembler at the local Trailblazer Apparel Company

The story begins in 1988, on Amanda's 18th birthday, when she is set to empty a $200,000 Trust fund funded by contributions by well-wishers in the wake of the original Wellbaby miracle. She will discover that the account has been bankrupted due to illegal investment activities by the Trustee that are directly connected to the sudden shutdown of the Trailblazer plant, which puts a quarter of the town's population out of work, including Floyd Smoll.

The story follows the separate lives of the now-penniless Amanda, unemployed Floyd, and other members of Iron Lake over a ten-month period until their lives are dramatically reunited.

As an Okie, What I love about The Wellbaby is how spot on Grenville "gets" the rural Panhandle mentality. I grew up in a town just like Iron Lake. And I can tell you that all of the kinds of people in the novel--corrupt politicians, racist cops, white supremacist groups, poor and powerless townspeople, and harried minorities--lived in my town and still live there today.

This all may sound morose, but The Wellbaby is actually a comic novel at its core. It's quite hilarious in parts, especially those scenes that feature Amanda Prahl, a wild, hard-drinking, independent, sex-loving cranky, hell-raising teenager who is fiercely loyal to her friends but won't put up with crap from anybody.

Amanda is the best female character I've seen in years. Even though she's economically powerless, she stands her ground for things she believes in, and won't be cowed by any of the many men who try to control her. Even though she probably wouldn't admit it, she embodies the best aspects of feminism without blatantly realizing that she is one.

Grenville's writing is straightforward. He'll win no prizes for style, but he's a great storyteller in the southwestern comic tradition of Augustus Longstreet and Mark Twain. The dialogue crackles with sarcasm, one liners, and endless vulgarity (the first spoken word by Amanda is the f-bomb) and each character has a fully distinct speaking style. And he has created a town with a rich history, folklore and geography that echoes what Faulkner did in his books set in Yoknapatawpha County

Since I'm supposed to point out flaws as well as strengths, some of the backstories--particularly Floyd's--go on for a bit. He's not nearly as interesting a character as Amanda, but I see how Grenville felt it necessary to demonstrate the various traumas--the early death of his mother, a violent and abusive father, an impoverished childhood, a loveless marriage--that leave him susceptible to the nefarious influences that turn law-abiding citizens into angry, hateful men.

The Wellbaby is not for children or for prudes. There's not a huge amount of sex in it, but what's there is, as Spencer Tracey one said of Katherine Hepburn, "cherce," including an extended, clinically explicit scene that somehow manages to be intensely erotic and hilarious at the same time.

Finally, what I love about The Wellbaby is that it's one of an increasingly rare breed of realistic fiction books that's not a navel-contemplating roman-a-clef about struggling New Yorker actors, writers and ad executive, struggling Ivy League academics or struggling rich suburban families. It's about real people at the bottom of the economic ladder struggling to claim their share of the American dream.

Yeah, I remember reading the sample chapters on the sitelast year, too. even though I've never been to Oklahoma (wasn't that a song?) and, after reading this have no intention of going (sorry, Wendy!)

I really like the book as well. Amanda is a fantastic, well-developed character. At times bitter, sarcastic, impulsive, violent, tender, protective, sensuous, and thoughtful, she lets everything hang out--literally. She's a flawed heroine, caught in a trap that is in many ways of her own making, but her battles to break out if are entertaining. She reminds me of Huckleberry Finn in many ways--a surface bumpkinism that hides a shrewd sense of intelligence.

I agree with you about Floyd. It's hard to find too much to like about him, but the author really does a good job of showing us how he became unlikable. I've known a lot of Floyds in my life, and usually their anger comes from a core of self-loathing. For women who want to understand how 'normal' men become angry white men, Floyd's story is a great case study.

I also really like the character of the mayor of the town. On the surface, he seems like the typical corrupt small-town politician, and he's clearly beholden to the town's business class, but, when push comes to shove, he really does try to do the right thing, and he's a great storyteller spoiler alert.

I also like the way the author weaves stories in the narrative. Some of them are expository; some are autobiographical, but they all add up to provide a deeper understanding of the town and its characters. If you're looking for a fast-paced page turner, this isn't it. It meanders, like a river, but when the big narrative punches come, they come like right hooks.

And, without spoiling anything, I'll just say that the final scenes of the book are fantastic.

Put me down as another Wellbaby fan. I can see why the author self-published it. It's not a story about self-loathing New York advertising executives or writers with writer's block or suburban lawyers with crumbling marriages or self-absorbed college professors facing midlife crises or divorced women flying off to Italy to rediscover themselves, and despite it's being set in the heartland there aren't any zombies, werewolves or vampires, so it's no wonder a regular publisher wouldn't touch it.

Instead it's a story of (horror!) working people like me who have been screwed over by big business. And the author totally gets how most people who are screwed direct their anger not at the banks and the oil companies who sold them down the river but at minorities, gays, and women. If you want to know how disillusioned white men end up joining hate groups, militia, and other assorted right wing nutjob causes, the Wellbaby provides a perfect case study in the character of Floyd Smoll, the man who rescued Amandra Prahl from the well.