Title: Bell Hammers
Series: -
Series: -
Author: Lancelot Schaubert
Publisher: -
Genres: Adult Fiction, Humor, Historical
Format: Ebook
Publication Date: October 12th 2020
Pages: 346
Synopsis (Goodreads): Remmy grows up with Beth in Bellhammer, Illinois as oil and coal companies rob the land of everything that made it paradise. Under his Grandad, he learns how to properly prank his neighbors, friends, and foes. Beth tries to fix Remmy by taking him to church. Under his Daddy, Remmy starts the Bell Hammer Construction Company, which depends on contracts from Texarco Oil. And Beth argues with him about how to build a better business. Together, Remmy and Beth start to build a great neighborhood of "merry men" carpenters: a paradise of s'mores, porch furniture, newborn babies, and summer trips to Branson where their boys pop the tops of off the neighborhood's two hundred soda bottles. Their witty banter builds a kind of castle among a growing nostalgia.
Then one of Jim Johnstone's faulty Texarco oil derricks falls down on their house and poisons their neighborhood's well.
Poisoned wells escalate to torched dog houses. Torched dog houses escalate to stolen carpentry tools and cancelled contracts. Cancelled contracts escalate to eminent domain. Sick of the attacks from Texaco Oil on his neighborhood, Remmy assembles his merry men:
"We need the world's greatest prank. One grand glorious jest that'll bloody the nose of that tyrant. Besides, pranks and jokes don't got no consequences, right?"
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My rating: - / 5 ★
I'm not rating this book as I end up DNF-ing it. (DNF = Do Not Finish)
Bell Hammers is not the kind of book that I often read, so it was no surprise that I end up unable to finish it. It is a little bit of a shame though, because while I quite liked the main character, Remmy, I probably could not get myself familiar with the writing style.
It is not exactly a bad writing style, but it has a touch of country-ish sound to it, and the satyr and sarcasm included in most parts went over my head. A lot of historical parts were mentioned too, and as I am not familiar with the country and place the events took place, I was not able to get them either. There were multiple times where I had to continuously reread the pages or chapters, because I did not understand what was going on.
In terms of the characters, they are quite likeable. The story started when Remmy is a young boy, and reading about him growing up made me able to warm up to him, and I like how respectful he is towards his father and grandfather. He was up to mischief most of the time, but it was fun to read about his pranks. Occasionally, I found myself laughing along to the jokes he made. I enjoyed his banters with Beth too—the girl that used to ignore him and ended up marrying him later.
Overall, I like the characters, but I could not get the story. Although this may not be my cup of tea, if you enjoy reading books with humour and country people, this may be a good book to check out.
Many thanks to the author for sending me a copy of Bell Hammers in exchange for my honest review.
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Till next time ♡ Love, Aishah Humaira'
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