Review: Torn by Richard Snodgrass

A novel about the challenges of homecoming and the hopeful pursuit of second chances, Torn by Richard Snodgrass is a visceral story of love, loss, and legacy.

John Lincoln Lyle returns to his hometown of Furnass after twenty years in the Army, but his time away was transformative and unforgiving. After years of experimental surgeries on his face following a devastating accident, he conceals the ghastly wounds with a mask, but his family name won’t let him hide for long. Navigating the perils of public life for the first time in two decades, investigating the tangled state of his family’s fortune, and exploring a chance at romance he had long ago abandoned, John Lincoln’s reappearance in Furnass sends ripples through a community historically untouched by time.

Gus Lyle, John’s elder brother, is the owner of the Steam Works factory, a cornerstone employer in town, and a man whose hard-fisted business practices have earned him a handful of enemies. Anna O’Brien, the proprietor of an upscale restaurant, befriends John Lincoln, perhaps hoping that his family connection can help her find justice for the workplace injury that has left her husband comatose. In this nascent age of the automobile, with the threat of a Second World War only growing larger, irresistible change is coming to Pennsylvania coal country, and John Lincoln’s resurrection may be the perfect catalyst.

Fraternal tensions and small-town suspicions imbue this patiently unfolding story with tightly wound suspense, with each scene offering more insights about Lyle family history, deep grudges, shadowy secrets, and ulterior motives. Capturing the grit, smoke, and strife of a mill town in the 1930s requires immersive narration and vivid descriptions, but what lends the most authenticity to this story are the multi-dimensional characters that inhabit the town. Anna O’Brien, John Lincoln, Gus Lyle, David Laughlin, Mary Lydia, and Missy are each fully formed figures in this story, complete with their own biases, secrets, and desires. The interweaving of their relationships is believable yet scandalous, from David’s hidden infatuation and Gus’ dangerous temper to Anna’s forbidden resentment and John Lincoln’s righteous scheming.

Themes of familial forgiveness, subtle revenge, misremembered emotions, and childhood trauma are present throughout the narrative, along with explorations of PTSD, intense financial stress, jealousy, and taboo forms of love. The omniscient storytelling gives readers an expansive overview of the novel’s events, but Snodgrass is careful to pace his revelations, which unfold with tension as intense as any thriller.

From a technical standpoint, the prose is remarkably clean and consistent, painting a clear picture of Furnass and its inhabitants, from the classy interior of the Grand Hotel and the bustling clamor of Steam Works to Mary Lydia’s pastoral farm and John’s comforting booth at Anna’s Parlour. The character dialogue is rich and plot-moving, without feeling stilted or forced, and aside from occasionally anachronistic vocabulary, the editing is impeccably polished.

Adding to an already impressive history of this fictional town, this latest intimate and enthralling tale is the best Furnass novel yet, bringing the town so sharply to life that readers easily forget it’s fictional.