The Blue Hour

November 21, 2016
The characters in Pritchett’s new novel, a follow-up to Stars Go Blue, have poetic souls. On a particular morning, for example, one character tells her new lover, “You are Paralos to my Piraeus,” then goes on to explain this dual reference. This example represents both a strength and occasional weakness in the book. Pritchett is boldly lyrical, whether she is writing about the eyes of archangels or the dawning of a new day, or especially the love lives of her diverse cast of characters, united in both a quest for love and a residence around the beautiful Blue Moon Mountain. But there also is a need to explain, which feels unnecessary and excessive. The narrative flows seamlessly from love story to love story, and Pritchett finds some texture by writing variously in first, second, and third person. There are Joe and Gretchen, “exploring the crevices and peaks of their desire”; scholarly Jess and veterinarian Ruben; a meth head named Dandelion, hopelessly in love with a rodeo rider; new couple Flannery and Di, skittishly deepening their relationship; also Sergio and Flora, and Zach and Dora, and a handful of others. In this elegant book, there’s an appealing verisimilitude in the way the characters are variously, tentatively connected.

December 1, 2016
One man's death sends wide shock waves across a Colorado community.This piercing novel in stories by Pritchett (Red Lightning, 2016, etc.) turns on a suicide: Sy, the longtime veterinarian in a rural mountain town, ended his struggle with schizophrenia by stealing a gun and shooting himself in a remote foothill. That's unquestionably a tragedy, but Pritchett's story doesn't stay in grievance mode. As the perspective shifts among multiple characters, the tone shifts from erotic to romantic to comic. Anya, Sy's widow, contemplates her sex life and the affair she pursued after Sy's diagnosis. Her neighbor Gretchen is fixated equally on sex and the charm of the outdoors, at least until she has a run-in with a bear. Ruben, Sy's now-unemployed assistant, is pursuing a relationship, a flirtation with a neighbor and encroaching meth-lab operators who want access to the vet's stash of chemicals. Joe, Gretchen's boyfriend, is preparing to adopt the daughter of his dying brother. Those are just a few of the intersecting sweet-and-sour relationships that shape the novel, which is also anchored by plenty of blue imagery: the setting is Blue Moon Mountain, the mood is often blue, and sky and water themes are plentiful. So is the occasionally pretentious riff on the trope. We're meant to believe that salt-of-the-earth Joe leaves his brother a voicemail saying, "When the sun drops, the world turns blue. The snow is blue, the air itself is blue." And the mass of characters in this relatively short book dilutes the force of its strongest ones, Anya and Ruben in particular. But Pritchett is on to something interesting by striving to interweave eros and pathos: "People tend to talk about real things, big things, when they're side-by-side," says one young female narrator to her lover, and then she proceeds to discuss Sy's death--in Pritchett's hands a peculiar but sweet tribute. An original meditation on sex, love, and death.

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Starred review from March 1, 2017

Pritchett (Stars Go Blue) packs her novel with memorable characters whose lives intersect in unpredictable ways, changing everyone. Winter in Blue Moon Mountain, a tight-knit Colorado town, begins with shocking news. Town veterinarian Sy has committed suicide with a gun stolen from his friend Joe, the local farrier. Sy seemed to have a solid family life, but his wife, Anya, is having an affair with Sergio, the wildlife agent. Joe's relationship with Gretchen is going well until his dying friend Tate asks Joe to raise his daughter, Honey. If he does, he'll lose Gretchen. Ruben, Sy's assistant, continues to help the community despite not having a veterinary license. When he is approached by a couple wanting to purchase a large quantity of iodine for hoof disease, Ruben recognizes the signs of a meth lab. As winter ends, such entanglements complicating the simple rural life of the townspeople do not make for neat and tidy lives. Blue Moon Mountain people are in a period of their lives the author calls the blue hour, the period at dusk, a time when everything changes. VERDICT PEN USA/High Plains award winner Pritchett links her characters in a seamless tale of uneasy lives poised for change in one Colorado mountain community. A pitch-perfect story from a superb writer.--Donna Bettencourt, Mesa Cty. P.L., Grand Junction, CO

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from December 15, 2016
Gretchen lives for the moments of pure delight when she can be with Joe. Joe revels in loving Gretchen out in the mountaintop meadow where their passion can be witnessed only by stars and the bears who patiently watch from the ringing forest. Ruben's gentle touch with animals also extends to the humans who come into his orbit, like Lillie, not quite old enough to be his mother but still young enough to covet his attention. Violet and Ollie, Flannery and Di, Sergio, Jess, Zach, Dandelion, and all the other residents of Blue Moon Mountain are connected, not only by the sheer beauty of their surroundings and their reverence for nature but by the shocking suicide of Sy, the local vet, whose death mystifies them and sends them digging deep within themselves to recover that essential life force that can prevent them from following in his tracks. Within this close-knit community, Pritchett (Red Lightning, 2015) finds the core of the humanitylove, lust, loyalty, compassion, companionship, caringwondrously bound in the stories of these incandescent characters, who want to survive on their own terms but who also learn that sustenance is only possible when supported by community. A richly sensual, tenderly proffered portrait of the most vulnerable yet appealing aspects of the human condition.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)