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Title: Songs in Ordinary Time
Review: This is not a great book by any means; the characters have very few redeeming qualities and for the most part you don't really like them. But, strangely, I was drawn to finish this book to see what happened. I could not read it for very long without having to put it down, though, because the characters and their existences are so depressing. I was especially disturbed by the mother, Alice, who can't seem to see that her troubles are of her own making, and who psychologically and verbally abuses her children. The whole Presto Soap scam was so implausible that I felt certain that Morris must have had some other intention in dragging it on for so long. You kept hoping that Alice would get some sense and finally see what was going on. Her youngest son, Benjy most depicted the result of Alice's psychological and verbal abuse on the children; very scary. All in all, I have to say that it was a fascinatingly disturbing read.
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