Perhaps the most interesting thing about Richard Ford’s “Wildlife” is how little actually happens. It covers a three day period during which…. But I don’t want to give it away! The journey (shouldn’t there always be a journey?) is for the teenage boy, Joe, and we see the whole thing through his eyes.
What’s also interesting about this, therefore, is where the story sits on the ‘show vs. tell’ spectrum. Some people might argue that we get an awful lot of ‘telling’ as Joe gives us his view of the world; the ‘showing’ is all through his eyes. I don’t have a problem with that, though I suspect others might. Mind you, that’s no surprise given I’m inclined toward the telling / exposition end of the rainbow in my own fiction.
I find Ford’s work reliable in the sense that it’s well-written, nicely paced, easy to read. I know I’ll turn to him again in the future.
Ian Gouge - Writer 