Down Sand Mountain

I don't think Dewey Turner and his friend, Darla, ever make it together down Sand Mountain.

You'll have to read the book --- or, perhaps, you already have --- and tell me if they do. My recollection is leaning toward one conclusion about that issue --- it's been a while since I finished it, but you can let me know in your own review when you post it what you think.

It's like a lot of things about the book, though. There is not the easy this or that or black-and-white of easy thinkers there. It's not necessarily a read for the sanctimonious or for persons who would wrench all the color out of it. Hence, it can be said that the book moves a little slowly and perhaps a little delicately, but given the circumstances, maybe that's a good thing. After all, it was 1966, and even if it didn't seem to move so slowly back then, compared with today, it did.

I don't pretend to know whether the youth of today can tolerate a slow read or more complex issues than puritanical crap. Of course, I don't mean to lump them all together, for in my mind, to some degree that is the message of the book: to take your time, to make a careful and considered analysis, to decide what is important, and not to make quick and hasty judgments of people, but to value everybody for their uniqueness.

I think there's a lot to say about an artificial mountain made of sand from the tailings of mining in the flat lands of Florida as it relates to Dewey and Darla and their respective trips down it. What do you think?