Killers of the Flower Moon -- A Movie Review

 

 

     So do these two pictures look like they're of the same guy to you? I mean, I know the hairstyles are different and one has a mustache and the other doesn't. But really?! 

     Truth be told, the first photo is of Leonardo diCaprio in Killers of the Flower Moon, and the other is of Matt Damon in Oppenheimer. So, okay, I don't go to the movies often, and I don't follow Hollywood news about which actor is feuding or sleeping with whom or who is now, will be, or once was married to whom. So I got confused. I actually watched all of Killers of the Flower Moon thinking I was seeing Matt Damon as the male lead and thinking he was doing such a good job. Actually I thought he did a good job in Oppenheimer, too. Which he did, but it was diCaprio who did a good job in Killers of the Flower Moon.

    

     This fall I was so excited about Oppenheimer and Killers of the Flower Moon that I could hardly wait for them to come out. 

     Both films are about real people and real events. Oppenheimer, of course, hit the theaters first and I hated it. I'm not a fan of comic-book-superhero-movies. I don't go to see them. I had no idea who Christopher Nolan is, but now I certainly do. Had I known back then, I probably would have understood the 4th of July fireworks and sex and flashback sex not to mention, the chaotic visuals and noise that were suposed to be going on in the scientist's mind. It was a fantasy/adventure story for juvenile males instead of a serious film about one of the two most life-on-Earth-altering developments of World War II.

     I had been waiting for Killers of the Flower Moon since the book came out in 2017. (Read my book review of it here.) But after seeing Oppenheimer, I decided not to see Killers of the Flower Moon in the theater. I would wait until it went to streaming, then if Hollywood screwed it up to the point that I needed to rant and rave and throw things, I could. Without legal ramifications.

     Last week a family member sent me a link to a Rolling Stone (October 18, 2023) article about a 2019 meeting between Scorcese with members of his production team and leaders of the Osage Nation held in Pawhuska, Oklahoma. Then I checked to see who the screen writers were. Eric Roth, Martin Scorsese, and David Grann. Yes, David Grann who wrote the book in the first place. And an excellent book it is.

    So when the movie opened Friday, I went to my local theater -- ALONE. Just in case I needed to leave before it was over. 

     It was the 4:25 showing and the theater was fuller than I expected. Mostly older people. They were a noisy group before the film started and I dreaded being in the theater with a bunch of people in party mode for what I considered (and hoped) would be a serious film about a time in our country's history when corrupt people in high places spread terror and death among the Osage people in my native state of Oklahoma. By the end of the movie, the theater was quiet.

     

     Rather than taking on the whole Osage Nation's story of terror and death at the hands of certain rich and powerful white men as Grann's book does, and its focus on the FBI's investigation, Scorsese focused on one family -- Mollie and Ernest Burkhart, her three sisters Anna, Minnie, and Rita, and their mother Lizzie Q. They were full-blood Osage with headrights. The Osage were already rich from leasing their grazing lands, then oil was discovered. The Osage, as a nation, became the wealthiest people in the world.

      Some background to explain Osage headrights, from Osage Nation Lands and Minerals Fact Sheet:  "Because the Osage had purchased their own reservation land, they were exempt from the individual allotments under the Dawes Act. Under the wise leadership of Chief James Bigheart, the Osage insisted on the following unique provisions in their Osage Allotment Act of 1906:

(1) Instead of allotting just 160 acres to each person and selling the rest, as other tribes had been forced to do, the Osage allotted all their reservation land to their people. This gave 657 acres each to the 2,229 registered Osage (Grann 52). 

(2) Reserved Communal Mineral rights:

(a) They “reserved” - held back from allotment - their mineral rights: the right to mine or produce oil and gas, rocks, and minerals from under the ground was not allotted, and so was

never lost.

(b) They retained communal ownership of these reserved mineral rights, so all subsurface

minerals belonged to the entire tribe instead of individuals. Instead of leaving to chance who

might get rich later from oil and gas being found on their particular allotment, all tribespeople share equally in any mineral wealth (Wilson 62).

Each received a “headright” - right to a share of the whole mineral interest (oil) income - which could be passed on from generation to generation."

     The Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) continues to be responsible for collection and dispersal of the income from Osage lands. From 1906 to 1978 the BIA allowed non-Osage to inherit headrights and to receive the income that goes along with them. 

     Add to that: "On March 3, 1921, Congress passed a law requiring the Osage to pass a measure of competency proving they could manage their funds responsibly. If they couldn’t, they would be appointed a guardian until a legal age. This immediately opened the door for con artists, unscrupulous businessmen, and corrupt lawyers and bankers to siphon off funds from annual royalties. Several Osage people were swindled out of their individual headrights without knowing the full value of their contracts. Many Whites even married their way into rich Osage families to exert their legal rights as spouses and obtain guardianship that way.
     ".... As with any appointed guardianship, if the ward died before the legal age of competency, the guardian could petition to inherit their estate." [From the National Archives]

     And that, friends and neighbors, was the impetus for the Reign of Terror against the Osage Nation which was the basis for Grann's book and Scorsese's film Killers of the Flower Moon.

     These are the real people on whom Scorsese focused his film:

 

           The sisters Rita, Anna, Mollie, and Minnie               Their mother, Lizzie Q

      Ernest Burkhart              William King Hale             FBI Agent Tom White

Rita and her husband Bill Smith's home after it was blown up.

     The movie starts off with a scene of the rolling grasslands of Osage County. It is still, to this day, beautiful country, where you can see as far as you can look. 

     The film treats Mollie and her family like people, not stereotypes. Lily Gladstone as Mollie and Tanttoo Cardinal are excellent. Leonardo diCaprio portrays Ernest Burkhart with a depth of emotion appropriate to a man who knows the difference between right and wrong. And Robert DeNiro plays William King Hale from Hunt County, Texas, without ever betraying his own personal history as a New Yorker and an ethical man.

Some of the dialog is actually in Osage. Keeping in mind these events happened in the  Roaring 20's when every Osage County town was a boomtown, so the costumes, forms of transportation, and rowdiness are representative of the times.

(Just a couple of side notes: oil doesn't come spouting out of the ground. It may pool or puddle. And if a well is being drilled it may be a blow-out. But a spindly little geyser? No. I guess Hollywood just had to have its kitsch. Just pretend you don't see that. Same with the weird inclusion of a radio play with Scorsese's cameo at the end. A radio play? Well, actually, yes. Grann explains in his book -- the radio play not Scorsese, he's not THAT old -- actually happened. "In 1932, the FBI began working with radio program “The Lucky Strike Hour” to dramatize its cases. One of the first episodes was based on the Osage Nation murders.")

It's a good movie. I definitely recommend it with the caveat that it is a serious movie about real people and real events. A terrible time on our history that we must not allow to happen again.

 

  

                                    

  

     

The Wheels of Justice

 

Artist's rendering of a Protective Order hearing

before Judge Chutkan in Trump’s D.C. case, 

from CNN

     Jay Kuo, in his Status Kuo Substack, reminds me to patience. He explains the steps in the process toward justice. Steps toward justice, the wheels of which I’ve heard many times in my long life, turn slowly. 

     Too many times this process seems not only slow, but like a maze. A maze whose every turn I fear will be a dead end.

     Kuo’s step by step explanations remind me that we are a nation of laws. Laws that our Constitution requires protect all of us, including a criminal defendant. 

     I know that’s not how it always works. I’m old, not devoid of common sense. And I’m certainly not immune to the fear that the rich and powerful among us can and, too often do, get away with all kinds of stuff and the ex-President might, too. 

     I know, I know. In Trump’s case, rich may be much less rich than we’ve been led to believe and powerful may be more about those with actual money and power who support him.

     Kuo reminds me that the slow legal process leading to justice must be meticulous and methodical. He reminds me that the steps being taken in this particular case are and must be “by the book.”

     Because these trials involve an ex-President, they can be seen to be without precedent. Which doesn’t seem right to me, just because an ex-President is the defendant. He should somehow be better than an “ordinary” person? Nonetheless, it is on the bases of precedents, that the judicial system moves. And, it appears that the courts are going to have to rule that the extant precedents do apply to the Trump cases. Those slow wheels. Those slow wheels.

     In that same long life, I’ve lived, I seem not to have learned the lesson of patience. So, Jay, keep reminding me and maybe I’ll live long enough to see justice served. 

             If you would like to read Kuo’s article, go to
         https://statuskuo.substack.com/p/taming-the-online-terrorist

        If you would like to read Kuo’s article, go to https://statuskuo.substack.com/p/taming-the-online-terrorist

 

Plastic? PLASTIC!

 

        From Jokes and Pokes on FB

Plastic! Our polyester clothes, water jugs and jugs of kitty litter. Drinking straws and stir sticks at our favorite coffee shop. Even 'paper' cups are, more often than not, plastic coated. Parchment paper and butcher paper? Yep, plastic coated. Hey, though, Cut-Rite wax paper is NOT. Plastic coated, that is.

In Colorado we pay 10 cents for what they call single-use plastic bags to carry whatever we buy home in. (I know. I ended that sentence with a preposition.) But I do reuse those bags when I clean the kitty box. (I’ve been saving them since before Daddy died, because he knew they’d eventually be outlawed or restricted somehow, so I have a lifetime supply in that little skinny closet at the end of the counter in the kitchen. And what’ll I do after that runs out, well it’ll be cheaper to buy a box of single-use trash-can liners than to pay 10 cents apiece at a store for one.)

I actually like people bringing their own bags. It’s more interesting while you stand in the check-out line, because you can check out other people’s bags. Some of them are pretty or odd, great big or little bitty. Of my bags, my personal favorites are the one from Lucile’s Creole Café in Littleton, CO. It was for carry-out food during the old CoVid days, so it’s a nice big size. Yes, the food was in plastic or aluminum trays with plastic lids. And the smaller bag from Pops convenience store/gas station/diner/motorcycle rider destination in Arcadia, OK. It had a couple of souvenir t-shirts in it. They launder nicely so it’s safe to say, they’re polyester/cotton blend.

I’m getting better about remembering to put my bags back in the car after the stuff is put away. And when I forget them in the car and have to walk back to get them. Well, that’s just extra steps and that’s good for me, right?!

I’m not sure what the solution will be to reduce our dependency on plastics, but I have every faith that someone will solve the problem and someone else will find a cure for at least some of the cancers, and several someone elses will broker lasting peace in the Middle East and in Ukraine and in the U.S. Congress.

photo from Discover Magazine

David Copperfield --- A Book Review

The Kindle Cover

After reading Barbara Kingsolver's 2022 novel Demon Copperhead, a retelling of Dickens' David Copperfield, my addiction to reading Dickens took over.

I say "addiction" because that's the best way I can describe my love/hate relationship with that venerable author. Periodically I get this uncontrollable urge to read him. Then about three-quarters of the way through I vow NEVER to read him again.

I did better this time. According to my eReader, I got to 83 percent complete before I hit the red line. 

I think Dickens himself understood my situation.
     “Ah, child, you pass a good many hours here! I never thought, when I used to read books,
     what work it was to write them.” Copperfield's aunt said.

     “It’s work enough to read them, sometimes." he responded. 

These quotes from David and his aunt come in Chapter 62 (Yes, I said 62, How many books these days even have a Chapter 62?! According to Google, most modern novels have 10 to 12 Chapters.)

This is the original illustration
from the publication of Charles Dickens' David Copperfield in serialized form

beginning in May of 1849 and running through November 1850. 

It was published as a 624 page book in 1850.

Of course this was then, its publication date, five years before the Flying Cloud, a clipper ship, set the world's sailing record for the fastest passage between New York and San Francisco, 89 days 8 hours. That was by sailing around the Horn, Cape Horn, the southern most tip of South America. Because that was more than a half-century before the completion of the Panama Canal.

It was also well before radio, television, the internet, and streaming sight-and-sound entertainment into our homes. Most of Dickens' novels, including David Copperfield, were originally published in weekly or monthly installments in journals, which Dickens himself edited. Each month, subscribers would get a few chapters wrapped up in printed wrappers with illustrations, by the same illustrator who did the book. Someone in the household, would read to the rest while they listened and did what they did -- darning socks, tatting, shelling peas, mending harness, or perhaps sitting comfortably in their favorite chair enjoying a manly cigarette and sipping sherry or dipping a lady-like strip of toast in their tea. 

For the price of a half-penny, those who did not have subscriptions and probably could not read, could have the latest installment read to them.

Hence, the wonderfully descriptive Dickens passages like these describing Copperfield's childhood home before his widowed mother remarried. When you read these sentences, listen to what you are reading as the people back then would have done. Maybe even read them aloud.

     "On the ground floor is Peggoty's kitchen, opening into a back yard; with a pigeon-house
     on a pole, in the centre, without any pigeons in it; a great dog-kennel in a corner, without
     any dog; and a quantity of fowls that look terribly tall to me, walking about, in a menacing
     and ferocious manner." 

And then several more sentences, equally long, and equally descriptive about the geese kept at the house Copperfield was born into. Keeping in mind that they lived in town not on a farm. In Victorian times, those well-enough-off to own their home, commonly kept food animals and had servants. David's mother had one, Peggoty.

Dickens describes the interior of the home quite completely including the store room one had to pass to get from the kitchen to the front door:

     "...a place to be run past at night; for I don't know what may be among those tubs and jars 
     and old tea-chests, when there is nobody in there with a dimly-burning light, letting a

     mouldy air come out of the door, in which there is the smell of soap, pickles, pepper,
     candles, and coffee, all at one whiff."

And from the bedroom window the young Copperfield could see "the quiet churchyard with the dead [including the father he never knew] all lying in their graves at rest, below the solemn moon."

     
     "There is nothing half so green that I know anywhere, as the grass of that churchyard;

     nothing half so quiet as its tombstones. The sheep are feeding there, when I kneel up, early
     in the morning, in my little bed in a closet within my mother's room to look out at it; and
     I see the red light shining on the sun-dial, and think within myself, 'Is the sun-dial glad,
     I wonder, that it can tell the time again?'"

Those readers and listeners, back then, knew this world. For them, these complete descriptions put them into the story just like we would be brought into the story today, if we were watching it on a screen.

Today's readers read much more quickly and do not want so much description. Plus the repetition in Dickens books necessary to recap what was previously read in last week's or last month's edition make reading Dickens today a slog as we read on and on in the equivalent of binge-watching. So our patience is tested, and, in my case, too often found wanting. And I complain. Out loud to my husband.

But his stories! Oh, my his stories! They are wonderful. Because the world! He lived in the world he wrote about. He paid attention to the people around him and he wrote their characters realistically.

I also, probably too often, read the gorgeously descriptive passages to my husband. I suppose it's no wonder my husband is always relieved when I finish a Dickens book.

For example: Dickens understood about the character Mr. Micawber, the kind and eternally optimistic would-be gentleman who continually lived beyond his means and ended up in debtor's prison. Along with his wife and ever increasing family. Dickens' own father spent time in debtor's prison, along with his wife and the younger Dickens children. 

It was at that point that twelve-year-old Charles was removed from school and sent to board with various family friends and work long hours in a blacking factory at very low wages, which had to be used to help pay for his care and the needs of his family in prison. He and his older sister spent their Sundays with their family in prison.

And the Dickens villains -- In David Copperfield we have the very attractive Steerforth. Of course we would have fallen under his spell, too. And the disgusting Uriah Heep! It was to the point where if he showed up again I wanted to rip that page out and hurl it across the world! And his mother with him.

But, of course, I was reading on my eReader....

Can I recommend you read David Copperfield? Of course I can. But I think listening to an audio version would be a good choice.

And I understand that the audio version of Demon Copperhead is well-done and would also be a good choice.

   

 

Something I Learned from Dickens

This is a photo of Charles Dickens from The Guardian, a British daily newspaper. To me, he looks like a kindly man looking at me, with sincere concern. 

I couldn't find an image of him smiling. I looked. Although he was an international literary celebrity, famous for his humor, satire, and cutting observations of people and society, he did live and work during the Victorian Era and smiling for photos was "simply not done."

Those of you who know me, know I am addicted to many things, one of which is Charles Dickens' novels. And as such, I periodically MUST read Dickens. Then about three-quarters of the way through, I swear I will NEVER read Dickens again.

Well, I read Barbara Kingsolver's Demon Copperhead (See my review here) and could not resist revisiting Dickens' David Copperfield.

Now I am of a region of the country and of a generation that falls easily and thoughtlessly into "old sayings." I say "thoughtlessly" lightly, but it is absolutely the correct adverb to use. 

About a quarter of the way through David Copperfield, I came to a statement by an as yet unimportant character named Malden. He said "I don't want to look a gift-horse in the mouth, which is not a gracious thing to do...." 

I do know what that means, or thought I did. Don't question good fortune, like it's bad luck or something. Not being of pre-automobile times, I never thought about what it literally means.

I have known for a very long time that horse traders are infamous for their sharp dealings when selling a horse, especially to an unwary buyer. The buyer should watch the horse move to be assured that it is sound on its legs.

 And the buyer should also check the horse's teeth, because you can tell its age and its general history of care from their condition.

So...when someone does you a favor or hands you a gift, of course it would be rude to look for a nefarious motivation or an otherwise flawed gift.

Who knew?!

And now that I look at that Dickens photo, I'm reminded of Fidel Castro. Oh, well.

I Voted Today

 

I'm up later than usual this morning. The traditional polling places open at seven in the morning, the first Tuesday following the first Monday in November. So if  I were going to the polls, I would not be first in line. 

                            This is my polling place!                                But first breakfast.

Since we live in Colorado, we can vote anytime after we receive our ballots in the mail. We got ours a couple of weeks ago. And about a week before that we received our Ballot Information Booklets -- One from the State for elective offices and statewide questions and issues and one from our county for questions and issues pertaining just to our county.

  

 

These booklets give the titles and text of the questions we are voting on plus a summary and analysis of those questions including arguments for and against and the fiscal impact of the question. 

For example: Amendment E to the state constitution, Extend Homestead Exemption to Gold Star Spouses "reduce property taxes for the surviving spouses of both United States Armed Forces service members who died in the line of duty and veterans who died as a result of a service-related injury or disease." Plus arguments for and against this amendment and the Fiscal Impact "Amendment E will increase state spending by $288,000 in state budget year 2023-24 to cover the reimbursements [to the counties who normally benefit from property taxes] authorized in the measure."

The State booklet also gives information about the judges being considered for retention. In Colorado, judges for the State Supreme Court, the Court of Appeals and the District Courts are selected through assisted appointment -- the governor selects a nominee from a list provided by a nominating commission. Those judges then come up for Retention votes two years after their initial appointment, then after 10-year-terms for the Supreme Court Justices, 8-year-terms for Appellate Court judges, and 6-year-terms for District Court judges. We vote yes or no on each judge up for retention.

An independent research firm conducts judicial performance surveys on judges. Commissions made up of attorney and non-attorney volunteers evaluate the information collected and makes recommendations of "meets performance standards" or "does not meet performance standards" which we voters can use to decide our vote. Good information for those of us who do not have courtroom experience with our judges, thank goodness.

When it comes to candidates running for the various and sundry offices, we voters are on our own.

 

                          Time to mark my ballot.                          Sign it and seal it in its special envelop.

Then pop it in a drop box. In this case outside the rec center where I have exercise class.

Civic duty done.

Demon Copperhead -- a book review

 

Demon Copperhead
by Barbara Kingsolver. 

See all those sticky notes? Those are passages worthy of noting. But then, my blog post would be almost as long as the book.

Demon Copperhead is Barbara Kingsolver's most recent novel. She is, in my opinion, the best writer working in the United States today. This novel is serious about serious subjects -- poverty, the oxycontin epidemic, the region-wide loss of livelihoods, and the generational loss of hope. 

I was a caseworker for the Oklahoma welfare department back in the late 1970s and early 80s. Logan County where I lived and worked was not the poorest county and our town Guthrie was not the poorest town in our State, but economic opportunities were very limited. What were the possibilities? Guthrie's population at that time was 10,300 plus or minus. It is 30 plus or minus miles from Oklahoma City and there was (and is, as far as I know) no public transportation available for those who would work in The City. There were jobs for people without a high school education, but not many and not well-paying. The two largest manufacturing businesses in our town were the furniture factory and the casket factory. The major grocery stores and Walmart at least offered medical insurance for full-time employees. Small business owners did as well as they could, but even their medical insurances came with high deductibles and copays and, for the most part, pay for their employees was low and medical insurance was the employees' own look-out. The people I worked with were people who had fallen on hard times and had basically no place to go and no way to get there if they did. But, for the most part they were not bad people.

The most important thing that I learned working in that job was that it is NOT true that people are whatever degree down-and-out they are because they're lazy or they make "poor choices." Or they're just "worthless and so was their whole family." I repeat, this is not true.

Kingsolver "gets it." She paints an unflinchingly stark and, at the same time, beautiful portrait of the countryside and poor people in Lee County, Virginia.

Kingsolver tells this story in first person from the title character Demon's point of view.

The world Demon was born into was definitely not any kind of  his "choice." His single, teenage mother was raised in Virginia's foster system. She had no "people." Demon explains his parentage and name "One of Mom's bad choices, which she learned to call them in rehab, and trust me there were many, was a guy called Copperhead. Supposedly he had the dark skin and light green eyes of a Melungeon, and red hair that made you look twice."

Whoa, rehab? So we've learned Demon's mom was a druggie. And Melungeon? A new word for me -- Wikipedia: "an ethnicity from the Southeastern United States who descend from Europeans, Native American, and sub-Saharan Africans brought to America as indentured servants and later as slaves. Historically, the Melungeons were associated with settlements in the Cumberland Gap area of central Appalachia, which includes portions of East Tennessee, Southwest Virginia, and eastern Kentucky." 

So didn't Demon have enough trouble without being considered "non-White?" in this county of about 20,000 people, 94% of whom are white.

Even the sunshine was limited in his world.

     “Living in a holler, the sun gets around to you late in the day, and leaves you early. In my
     years since, I’ve been amazed to see how much more daylight gets flung around in the
     flatter places. This and more still yet to be learned by an excited kid watching his
     pretty mom chain-smoke and listen to the birds sing.” 

Demon was unceremoniously born to that "pretty mom" alone in a rented trailer house. He loved her and took care of her the best that a child could for as long as he could. 

Their home was owned by Mr. and Mrs. Peggot. Mrs. Peg found the newborn Demon still inside his amniotic sac and attached to his unconscious mother. Mrs. Peg called the ambulance. The Peggots were the closest thing to responsible, caring adults in Demon's childhood. They owned the trailer house and lived next door with their grandson, Demon's best friend, "Maggot" (an unfortunate, but easily remembered corruption of his name Matthew Peggot.) Maggot's mother, one of the Peggot's daughters, was in prison for killing her abusive boyfriend (manslaughter.)

Again, which of these were "choices" of any kind for these children? Or the grown-ups either?

The Peggots were good people. They treated Demon and his Mom like family. But what about their "choices?" 

     "Mr. Peg knew about [when "Once upon a time, a nice piece of land and good prospects
     and a boy that loved his farming] back whenever he was a boy, his family did well with the
     corn and tobacco before they had to sell off their land a piece at a time for people to build
     houses on. Same with Mrs. Peggot, she started out as a little girl on a farm before their daddy
     sold his land for a certain number of hogs, one for each child. After that, their farm was a
     coal mine where her brothers worked and Mr. Peg also. Mining is how he got his crushed foot.”

Demon explains why these hard-working, God-fearing, family-loving people stayed. Even as tobacco and coal were on their way out? Their livelihoods were being discontinued.

     "Why does a man keep trying? A farmer has his land and nothing else. He's more than
     married to it, he's on life support. If he puts his acreage in corn or soy, he might net
     seven hundred dollars an acre. Which is fine and good for the hundred-acre guys.
     Star Wars farmers.

     "But what if he's us, with only three that can be plowed? In the little piece of hell that
     God made special for growing burley tobacco, farmers always got seven thousand
     an acre. A three acre field is no fortune, but it kept him alive. No other crop known to man
     that's legal will give him that kind of return....The rules are made by soil and rain and slope.
     Leaving your family's land would be like moving out of your own body."

Farming and mining were exiting stage-left leaving a very big niche to be filled by
     "a shiny new thing. Oxy Contin, God’s gift for the laid off deep-hole man with his back
     and neck bones grinding like bags of gravel. For the bent-over lady pulling double shifts
     at Dollar General with her shot knees and ADHD grandkids to raise by herself. For every
     football player with some of this or that torn up, and the whole world riding on his getting
     back in the game. This was our deliverance. The tree was shaken and yes we did eat of the
     apple.” -- Demon Copperhead

You know, it just seems like some people are doomed from their beginning. They survive one awful situation just to be thrown into the next awful situation. And Demon Copperhead is one among many of those people, but just like "some people," he persists and, like so many around him he tries. He loves. He's loyal to the people close to him.

With a really good story that is really well-written there will come a time that I can't ignore the sorrow and I weep. If it were a movie or a TV show, the story would get past the tears, but a book comes to a halt right there because you can't see to continue. I won't tell you the situation or the character who authors these words to Demon. This is where the book reaches that point. "Never be mean in anything. Never be false. Never be cruel. I can always be hopeful of you."  Words to live up to and to fall back on.

There are times Demon wants to give up, but he doesn't. He endures.

Me? I almost did give up and skip to the end to see how Demon Copperhead and his story come out. An unthinkable act on my part. My firm rule to finish any book I start, was left by the side of the aging- road some time ago, but I have yet to give up on a good book and jump to the end. 

Me and Demon Copperhead. I'm glad I didn't give up either.

From the blurb inside the front flap of the book cover: "...Charles Dickens wrote David Copperfield from his experience as a survivor of institutional poverty and its damages to children in his society."

          So now I guess I'm gonna have to read Dickens' David Copperfield.