American Rust
by Philipp Meyer
Award: LA Times Winner 2009
Nomination: Center For Fiction Finalist 2009, Dublin Longlist 2011
Date Read: May 18, 2021
American Rust is the perfect title for this novel as it occurs in a small, Pennsylvania town that has been abandoned by the steel mills that once supported a thriving middle class. Now, buildings are abandoned, futures look bleak and poverty is the norm. This is where we find Poe and Isaac, two unlikely friends that discover tangible humanity in one-another, although their interactions in this book are limited to only two.
Poe has been raised by his mother Grace, his father Virgil abandoned the family years before due to his wandering penis and a belief that something better was just around the corner. Similarly, Isaac was raised practically by no one as his mother committed suicide and his father permanently disabled due to a horrific factory accident. Isaac is benefited by having a successful sister, Lee, who believes in Isaac but has also abandoned him to become his father’s full-time caregiver.
Isaac’s carefully thought-out plan of escape is completely derailed due to a snow storm. Pure and simple. He had it all mapped out – the money he would need (stolen), his destination (California), and his goal (college). He seeks out one last meeting with Poe, hoping beyond hope that he would go with him. Poe is dead-set on staying but walks with him part of the way until both seek shelter from a freak snow storm.
I always find it shocking how small events can have huge and lasting results. Although parts of Meyer’s plot are contrived, his point is loud and clear – life can be altered at the drop of a hat. Bad luck can follow you like a stench and Americans are so swift in determining that bad luck was somehow deserved. I am guilty of this too and am constantly shaming my brain into a more benevolent perspective. If the situation were reversed, I would be incredibly thankful.
As much as American Rust is about the randomness of life, it is an indictment on the American Dream of hard work and earned rewards. Each of us are reliant on the whims of Big Business and when those businesses shutter or shift overseas, it is the worker that is blamed for idleness or ignorance. Never is it the fault of capitalism that benefits a select few.
Most of the characters we meet are good people with good hearts and good intentions that are tested by the crappiest of circumstances. Poe becomes a pawn in the prison power structure as he is held pending trial for killing a vagrant – a murder he didn’t actually commit. As his character is tested, he never fesses up that it was Isaac that actually did it, believing he could fare better in prison than Isaac.
Isaac, unaware of Poe’s arrest, escapes anyway and falls into the hands of those more desperate than he is. After testing his luck in the wide world, he returns to his hometown broke, starving, filthy and willing shed light on the truth.
What is most difficult to digest about this saga is that both Isaac and Poe exit this craziness relatively unscathed. I don’t fully understand the reasoning for the ending. It felt abrupt and ill-considered, whereas the rest of the book was well thought out. Overall, though, a solid effort with an important message.
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