1.
In the Lake of the Woods isn’t one of Tim O’Brien’s better rated books; it also isn’t among his worst. It stands in the middle, neither widely acclaimed nor often panned. Despite all this, it’s far and away my favorite O’Brien novel. The how is a bit hard to explain.
The book tells the story of John Wade, a former Lieutenant-Governor of Minnesota whose run for a seat in the US Senate—and political career as a whole—falls apart after scrutiny of his career as a soldier in Vietnam reveals a secret that Wade has spent decades hiding from everyone in his life. He and his wife, Kathy, retreat to a cabin at the Lake of the Woods to rethink their marriage and future. There—away from everything—everything seems normal, if not quite okay. And then Kathy disappears without a trace.
I could say the rest of the novel is about the search for Kathy, which is technically true, but a fairly incomplete description. In the Lake of the Woods has three kinds of chapters: the first is a traditional third-person narrative that mostly follows John Wade in the days after Kathy’s disappearance, but also covers his childhood, college years, and time in the military. The second, called ‘Evidence’ chapters, consist of interview excerpts and various facts, assembled as if pulled from a trial. The third, ‘Hypothesis’ chapters, use the new information gleaned from the previous two chapters to suggest what may have happened to Kathy that night. Did she flee in fear? Out of a lack of love for a husband turned stranger? Did John kill her? Is it possible that we may never know?
2.
Let’s take a break from the story for a minute. I know, weird thing to do in the middle of a post specifically about O’Brien’s novel, but there’s a point here. Before I started writing this piece, I was curious about whether other readers drew similar conclusions to my own or if I was significantly deviating from the norm. In the process, I became really fascinated with negative reviews of the book, with the readers who thought O’Brien’s characters were hard to connect to or flat, that the story’s disjointed nature did it a disservice, and especially that the connection to the American war in Vietnam was an overused and tired theme.
I agree, actually. Well, for the most part anyway. O’Brien’s characters do not develop over the course of the story, but are merely revealed. The non-linear telling robs the book of a traditional story structure and removes any sense of climax or resolution. These features are exactly why it succeeds. In the Lake of the Woods, for me, is a book about the secrets we keep. It’s about the fundamental unknowability of even those closest to us. It is about a man who, as a result of birth or circumstance, needs to be in control and also needs unlimited, unconditional love. And it is about the limitations of our own ability to perceive others.
“(“I love you,” someone says, and we instantly begin to wonder – “Well, how much?” – and when the answer comes – “With my whole heart” – we then wonder about the wholeness of a fickle heart.) Our lovers, our husbands, our wives, our fathers, our gods – they are all beyond us.”
-In the Lake of the Woods, Tim O’Brien; p.154
3.
This is to say that John Wade’s flatness isn’t a mistake: it’s the point. O’Brien writes the story as an outsider trying to understand John Wade—so we know how he turned out, but the point is to explore and understand why he became that way. Each chapter is an attempt to unravel the thick web of lies that Wade wove around himself as a form of protection.
The lack of resolution? That’s often how life works. Perhaps you have lost a friendship or relationship and you still don’t know why and perhaps never will. There will always be walls, always be limiting circumstances, always be something we don’t know. This knowledge is simply something that we have to learn to live with; inability to accept this fact is what powers the events of this very book.
O’Brien reveals, in essence, the ending of the book in a footnote early on.
“Moreover, there are certain mysteries that weave through life itself, human motive and human desire. Even much of what might appear to be fact in this narrative—action, word, thought—must ultimately be viewed as a diligent but still imaginative reconstruction of events. I have tried, of course, to be faithful to the evidence. Yet evidence is not truth. It is only evident.”
-In the Lake of the Woods, Tim O’Brien; p.48
This is not a book about the truth. It is about something far more real: it is about how the evident both reveals and conceals those we love from us.
Towards the end of Zamyatin’s We, I-330 says this:
“Who knows who you are…A person is a novel: you don’t know how it will end until the very last page. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be worth reading to the very end…”
-We, Yevgeny Zamyatin
Something to chew on.
Some other places you can find me.