Finished: April 3, 2025
Why I read this
When we left off, Damon was doing well in life. He had managed to escape homelessness and the foster system and was well on his way to being a popular football star. But seeing as there were still 200 pages left there was no chance that this was going to last. I always hope that just maybe these types of characters will succeed in turning things around and squeak out a happy ending. Yet, each page I turned I know that the inevitable fall would come, and our hero would not be living out his life as a famous football star, or even as a relatively happy small town artist. So the second half of this book continued with a cringe at each turn of a page for each victory and for each failure knowing that everything for Demon was about to fall apart and there was nothing that could stop it.
What I learned
As the good turned to bad and the bad turned to worse, Demon succumbs to a trap that I (and maybe many other readers) didn’t understand was set by the machine of capitalistic healthcare mixed with the outdated, and predatory coal mining industry. This trap being how the powerful mining company’s constructed an entire economy around a single industry, pushing out any opportunities for diversification or education to ensure that a maximum of people would be forced to work for them under almost any conditions, and in turn creating the backdrop for a perpetually impoverished, and eventually drug addicted population. It shocked me the causal relationship of the coal mining industry, which ground men’s bodies into painful husks over decades of heavy labor, to the aggressive sales of pharmaceuticals was able to lead to create such a perfect nest for addiction and abuse (by both the doctors and the patients). It was an interesting take to see how this was all a systematic issue and Kingsolver did not treat drug addiction as many other books do, even ones so acclaimed like The Goldfinch, where drug addiction arrived kind of by chance and took hold, but instead treated it as in inevitable outcome of a broken feedback loop. I enjoyed her continuous focus on the fact that it was not the people being addicted that were at fault, but the doctors, the sales reps, the government who failed to support the people who destroyed their lives with pill bottles.
Because what really struck me throughout the book was the age of the characters. Even the more “adult” characters were young. It made everything that happened so much more pungent knowing that there was so little real adult support around. Of course these characters were doomed to fail. When you drop out of high school at 16 and spend years taking care of a dying father then are left alone to fend for yourself, it’s not a stretch to end up in a bad situation. Because of course you don’t know what you don’t know and these kids were blissfully unaware of how little they did know. I was no stranger to the thought that I was more adult than I was when I was a teenager, but never did I have the same delusions of maturity as the characters here. It gave me a new perspective that I’m sure many parents have where you watch a kid going down the wrong path into oblivion and there’s nothing you can do to stop it, because they think that they know what is best. I just wanted to scream at the main character over and over again to ask what he was doing. He seemed so smart and reasonable yet he was repeatedly doings things that were just impossible to support. How could someone with a head on their shoulders make these decisions? The smoking, drinking, drugs and sex that these kids of 13, 14, 15 were getting into were absolutely shocking. I’ve of course seen on the news over the years the impacts of the opioids crisis in the US, but putting it into perspective and seeing how it can so easily propagate through our most vulnerable populations resulting in the deaths and destruction of people hardly old enough to drive was eye-opening. Scenes like a 17 year old, high on opioids coming home to his childhood sweetheart who has overdosed on fentanyl and having to clean up the scene before calling the authorities make the problems I encountered in high school seem like a fairy tale. That the most affluent country in the world could allow this kind of situation to impact thousands of rural communities, families and children is an undefendable failure.
Finally, I was touched by Damon’s feelings about Lee country and whether it was good for him or not. Like how in The Tipping Point or in Scarcity Brain context is extremely important (for example how priests won’t help someone out if they are in a rush, or how pigeons will more often choose a feeder with consistent rewards when in a cage similar to their natural habitat, but will choose a gambling type feed with inconsistent rewards when place in a barren cage), the context of Lee County, after a life of abuse and misery, would always and inevitably push Damon back into drug use. In discussing this he said quite strongly that “It’s hard to explain how you can miss a place and want it with all your hear, and be utterly sure it will obliterate you the instant you touch down.” It’s something that I can relate to, although to a much lesser degree. Moving to a new country, seeing a different way to live, separating myself fully from my American, North Carolina context was the only way for me to see some of the flaws with it. That my life had become rather robotic, that I was spending far too much of my time focusing on things that weren’t important and I had stopped growing like I should have. I love North Carolina and Raleigh and all that it has to offer. It has my family and closest friends, and each drive through the area after touching down fills me with nostalgia and the warm feeling of being home. Yet, if I were to accept to go back I feel like I would lose all the things I’ve done to develop myself further since moving to Europe. I’d read less and watch more TV. I’d live in a house that is far bigger than I need again. I’d see my family more often, but at a lower quality (1 weekend a month instead of a 2 full weeks twice a year). I’d go back to working evenings, and taking very little vacation. I’d make more money, but be less happy for it. Maybe in a few years I’ll be able to separate the person I was before I left from the place, but for now, like Demon, I know that it’s not the place for me to be in this period of my life.
Note that I’m writing this on the tail end of a trip to the US and a wonderful time with friends and family. I love it in the US and much of the South remains comfortable and familiar, but the trip only continued to confirm what I know about how I am quickly becoming incompatible with parts of the American life. Our polarized partisan politics, our broken healthcare system, too much consumption of too little quality, and a fiercely independent society that has chosen “freedom” over the common good. I imagine I will come to terms with the pro’s and con’s present in America vs. European countries, but for now I’m happy to feel confident in my choices for who and where I am is the best place for me to keep growing.
What I didn’t like
I think the hardest part of the book for me was watching the people who should have known better let Damon fall deeper and deeper into his trap. His grandmother, his best friend Angus, his foster parent Coach, his family/friends the Peggots all failing to intervene when he was clearly descending into oblivion and he only needed someone to pull him out. If his grandmother had just visited him when he was living with his girlfriend and understood the help that they needed and freely offered it, maybe he would have turned out differently. Even from a practical aspect she had invested a lot into Demon and he surely reminded her infinitely of her son, and all the mistakes and heartbreak in that relationship, yet she did nothing to change and support him further to ensure his successful living. I simply don’t believe a mother would act that way in this scenario.
Questions I asked
When an area has been pushed into the negative spiral of poverty and drug use, how do you turn it around?
What areas of our economy are currently running like the old coal industry? Where are industries buying up all the resources and trapping people into them? If these industries collapse like that of coal, what populations are going to be left devastated?
What will be the next modern crises covered by Pulitzer prize winners?
My Favorite Quote
“It’s hard to explain how you can miss a place and want it with all your hear, and be utterly sure it will obliterate you the instant you touch down.”
Demon Copperhead
Books I liked like this one
The Catcher in the Rye : J.D. Salinger (for the angst of young people against the adult world)
Hidden Valley Road : Robert Kolker (for understanding just how immature our medical system really is)
Book Reviews for Mom 