Demon Copperhead – Barbara Kingsolver

Expectation: An epic journey through the horrors of Appalachia.

Reality: Funny, poignant and utterly engrossing, it’s a blockbuster book that delivers - even if the last third feels a tad trite.

My Take:

Barbara Kingsolver’s modern retelling of Charles Dickens’ “David Copperfield” is a blockbuster in every sense of the word. Oprah’s Book Club blessing means it will find a wide audience, and every type of reader will find something to enthrall - whether you’re a fan of humor, family drama or social commentary.

Those who decide to jump on the book buzz bandwagon will be treated to a challenging, but wholly entertaining, exploration of life in modern Appalachia complete with the topics you’d expect to find — poverty and addiction — but paired with a heavy dose of gallows humor and reverence for the Appalachian way of life that makes even the most depressing sections easier to stomach.

Written as Damon (aka Demon) recounting his life (from birth until early-20s) in a somewhat stream of conscious narrative, it brought the character to life in vivid detail — curse words, local dialect and all — that made him one of the most likable and fully realized characters I spent time with in 2022.

Demon has a doozy of a life, but thankfully there’s nothing stereotypical or cynical in Kingsolver’s delivery. Orphaned by addiction, he bounces around the foster care system and lives in abject poverty before landing in a home that gives him everything while simultaneously taking it all away. 

He’s a victim of circumstances but not a victim. While he doesn’t always have the strength to ward off the evil that lurks around corners, he owns his mistakes and never loses the core of who he is — a resilient and loyal person trying his best. This makes it easy to root for him even when his journey goes off the rails.

While I’m giving the story five stars, solely on the strength of Demon’s characterization, it’s an imperfective narrative. Essentially the story is told in three distinct parts — Demon’s early life with his addict mother and family friends, the Peggots; Demon’s navigation of the foster care system; and his descent into addiction — the novel loses steam near the end. 

The last third was borderline trite, and I found myself switching to the audiobook more in the end (I tackled as a hybrid read/listen) to soldier through. Whereas the first two parts had an organic trajectory, in the final part it felt like Kingsolver was piling on every terrible thing imaginable to elicit outrage. Some of this could’ve been cut and the emotional punch still would’ve been delivered.

Overall character development was another criticism. Since it’s told as a first-person narrative, we only “meet” people through Demon and that means people that were perceived as incredibly important to his life — and that you begin to care about — are essentially forgotten near the end. 

There are a few exceptions — Angus, in particular — however it was disappointing to only get a one or two paragraph summary of some other key characters (Maggot, June and Emmy). Yes, this is true to life since people float in and out of your orbit, but for the amount of time Kingsolver dedicated to outlandish situations, a better use of ink could’ve been closing the loop on a few more people.

Still, this is a difficult novel to shake. Like Jude St. Francis, Evelyn Hugo, Little Dog and Olive Kitteridge before him, Demon enters the pantheon of literary characters permanently burned into my psyche. I’ll never be able to read a news story, or book, about Appalachia without thinking about him. If that’s not powerful storytelling, I don’t know what is.

As mentioned, I tackled this as a hybrid read/listen and my time with each format was split about 50/50. Charlie Thurston provided a solid performance as Demon (and other characters), but I enjoyed my time with the text more than the audio mainly because Thurston’s voice wasn’t the one I pictured for Demon. 

While Kingsolver’s writing takes some time to get used to — there are a lot of fractured sentences to match speech patterns — this is a great novel for format jumping if the length makes you nervous. Regardless of how you decide to experience “Demon Copperhead,” it's time well spent. 

Thanks to HarpersCollins Publishers, Harper Audio and Libro.fm for an advanced reader copy of the text and download of the audiobook. This exchange of goods has not influenced my review. 

Rating (story): 5/5 stars

Rating (narration): 4/5 stars

Formats: Hybrid read/listen (personal library)

Dates read: November 26 – December 12, 2022

Multi-tasking: Okay. The narration and writing are great, but you’ll miss a lot of detail due to the conversational style of writing.