GREENHORN VALLEY BOOK CLUB
The Greenhorn Valley Book Club had another lively and educational discussion about their latest book selection on Thursday, August 24. The reader’s opinions of the books may not always agree; but that is just part of what keeps the meetings interesting. The readers share different thoughts and views on the books, encouraging others to look at the books from different viewpoints.
The selection to read for the August meeting was Trust by Hernan Diaz. This complex and often deceiving story centers around money, the world of high finance, and the relationship between power and money. Throughout this ingeniously constructed historical novel, Diaz makes a connection between the realms of fiction and finance. The force of money in the stock market, and its potential, as a character in the novel says, 'to bend and align reality' to its own purposes is well displayed in the novel.
One of the major themes of Trust is power: who has it, how they got it, and how they maintain it.
In rather confusing twists and turns, Trust has four parts inside it: a novel within the novel followed by an autobiography in progress followed by a memoir, and finally a primary source.
Hernan Diaz is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of two novels translated into thirty-four languages. He is the recipient of the John Updike Award from the American Academy of Arts & Letters, given to “a writer whose contributions to American literature have demonstrated consistent excellence.”
Trust is his second novel, received the Pulitzer Prize for fiction and was a New York Times Bestseller, and the winner of the Kirkus Prize.
Most members of the Greenhorn Valley Book Club found Trust enjoyable, if a little hard to read. Diaz was praised for his creativity and unique style of writing in the book.
Many of the readers questioned if “ Truth” would not have been a better title for the book, as it was filled with characters filled with deception.