Redemption

Redemption Summary | Part 1 Summary

The first paragraph begins "One day in April," and in the same breath, the protagonist, Jack Hawthorn, is introduced and the main event of the story is disclosed. Jack was directly involved in the accident that killed his brother David. Jack describes the accident as preventable; if his reaction had been to slam on the brakes of the tractor, his brother might have been saved, but all he could do was sit frozen as he watched his younger brother be crushed by the cultipacker. Jack, 12 at the time, was driving the tractor while his sister, then 5, was riding on the back fender. His brother David, 7, had been riding on the cultipacker, an enormously heavy piece of machinery used to level out newly ploughed ground.

Dale Hawthorn, Jack's father, was nearly destroyed by David's death. Dale is described as being a "sensitive, intelligent man," a "dreamer." Even though Dale consciously blamed himself and God for the accident, sometimes blame seemed to land on Jack. Dale's emotions swung violently, he began smoking and taking long drives on his motorcycle. Dale thought about suicide, but refrained because of his responsibility to his remaining children and his wife. A local poet, he began having torrid love affairs and would frequently be away from the farm for days at a time. Jack and his uncles picked up the slack.

Jack's mother tried to comfort her remaining children, but she cried frequently, overwhelmed by grief. In an attempt to provide a more permanent distraction, she secured piano lessons for Phoebe and French horn lessons for Jack. She tried her best to keep her feelings a secret, coping with Dale's method of dealing with David's death.