Books like The Farmer's Daughter

I tend to always have a book with me. And not just where expected like a beach or an airplane, but also at solo restaurant breakfasts and places where authority makes us common folk wait, like doctor's offices, courtrooms and automobile service shops. What I've never understood though is how anyone could come upon me in rapt, public attention to my book and interpret that as an invitation to chat. Such encounters typically end with my new best friend leaving me with a literary recommendation. But I don't want to read John Grisham, nor do I care what five people await me in heaven. On a few occasions, however, the intruder has said, 'Jim Harrison', a mystic look spreading across the face. I had, of course, read the cultish reviews and even tried an earlier work of Harrison's a couple of decades ago. Yet I wondered at the faraway look. It was genuine and passionate. This was not someone who thought Bill O'Reilly spends hours in scholarly research and writes his own books. So, The Farmer's Daughter beckoned at a used book store. I paused because of the proliferation of Daughter books, but at least there wasn't an Alchemist or Apprentice in the title. Now, I understand.The Farmer's Daughter is three novellas, apparently a literary form the author fancies. They're not for everyone. Let's just say the men are often drunk and constantly tumescent. Sex happens, without a lot of foreplay. Like watching the macaques at the zoo. That doesn't mean that it isn't profound though:When he was eleven there was a neighbor girl who would show you her butt for a nickel but if you tried to touch it she'd smack the shit out of you. He'd heard that now she was a school principal up in Houghton.You either get that, or you don't.Nothing really made me wince but then I grew up in such language. Indeed, this felt like putting on the most familiar soft flannel shirt.And it's full of truths, like:Grandpa had a theory that you should never go after a female with a bad father because they're always pissed off. I've done no research on that theory but it sounds like it must be true.Jim Harrison is a wonderful storyteller. It's funny, yes, and it's been called 'masculine', whatever the hell that is. But there was lump in your throat heartbreak and profundity and I learned a lot of things like there are people suffering from anhedonia who can't experience pleasure, and that Antonio Machado was very wise when he wrote:Look in your mirror for the other one,the one who accompanies you.I could not put this down. (Advice, you know, for anyone who might be overdosing on Proust). Jim Harrison is an old man now, but he has a lengthy oeuvre, for which I am very happy.