Review: CASCADE by Maryanne O'Hara

"There are so many ways of drowning, my dear."

Shakespearean actor and ruined theater owner William Hart never spoke truer words to his daughter Desdemona than these, taken from in the opening pages of Maryanne O'Hara's splendid debut novel, CASCADE (Viking, August 2012). Floodwaters jeopardize the family's hometown of Cascade, Massachusetts, situated on land slated to become a reservoir. Devastating though such destruction would be, physical inundation is but a metaphor for the myriad forces threatening Cascade's inhabitants in 1935. Bankruptcy, foreclosure, and unemployment erode economic security; prejudice, anti-Semitism, and gender stereotyping sow division and distrust. Misunderstanding and unfulfilled promise spark dissatisfaction and boredom; greed and passion prompt ill-considered, life-shattering decisions. Love itself diverges into treacherous currents and inescapable eddies.

Artist and reluctant housewife Desdemona Hart lives the truth of her father's words. In order to save Cascade's famed theater and provide a roof over her dying father's head, Dez marries kind but dull Asa Spaulding, the town pharmacist. She tries to play the devoted wife, but once her father passes away--not before willing the theater to Asa, though he entrusts Dez with the work of preserving and reopening it--Dez realizes she can never become the wife Asa expects. Restless, nostalgic for the vibrant art world she knew in Paris and Boston, she immerses herself in her painting and pursues a relationship with Jacob Solomon, a Jewish artist-turned-traveling salesman. An outdoor tryst not only leads to the accidental drowning of a Water Authority agent but provides circumstantial evidence linking Jacob to the suspicious death of the town doctor. Even more damning, the couple's actions doom Asa's carefully orchestrated plan to force the Water Authority to flood a neighboring town instead of Cascade. Dez longs to flee with Jacob to New York, but Asa's ownership of her beloved theater ties her to him and to Cascade's fate.

As "Dez the wife" founders in a slough of deception, "Dez the artist" successfully navigates Cascade's shoals. She pitches a series of before and after postcards, pre- and post-flooding, to the editor of a national magazine. Wildly successful, the series establishes her professional reputation and opens doors to the New York art scene. Dez wears her role as the town's champion uneasily, however, as her series depends on the ultimate destruction of the milieu she records, a destruction she knows is virtually assured. The satisfaction she gains from her fame and the independence it wins her remain forever colored by the compromises she makes and the losses she suffers in its pursuit.

In this remarkable debut, author Maryanne O'Hara creates a setting as detailed and vivid as the historic postcards she features on her website. From the ornate theater building to the grill at Asa's drugstore to the gazebo on the town green, O'Hara captures the essence of a bucolic New England town of yesteryear. Yet, despite the idyllic setting, nothing and no one is quite what they seem. As complicated and messy as Dez's paint-splotched palette, O'Hara's characters hide more than they reveal, even from themselves, and a deft twist of the plot at the end muddies apparent certitudes. CASCADE evokes a world in transition, a world where immutability is an illusion and security a dream. Unabashedly self-conscious in its musings, the novel examines questions of broad import: How great a role does selfishness play in the execution of grand endeavors? Can art preserve the past? What is worth saving in a world where change is the only constant? Is it possible to escape the rush of duty and expectation and find "a place to breathe"?

Swept up in the beautiful language, striking images and finely nuanced conflicts of CASCADE's fictional world, this reader found herself holding her breath with rapt anticipation as she watched artist and town fight to preserve their integrity against the onslaught of circumstance. Sometimes, she learned, the only way to escape drowning is to fling oneself headfirst into the rapids and ride the current to a distant shore.

*****

Maryanne O'Hara earned an MFA from Emerson College and spent many years as Associate Editor for Ploughshares, the award-winning Boston literary journal. Her short fiction has won numerous prizes and has appeared in anthologies and literary journals. CASCADE is her first novel. You can watch the trailer for CASCADE here, as well as visit her website and blog. Maryanne and CASCADE were recently featured in a lengthy feature in the Boston Globe.

Tomorrow, Writing the Renaissance is pleased to feature a guest post by Maryanne. Please stop by to read why she chose to write about the 1930's.