Wolf Season 4 Stars

This is a novel about four characters indelibly traumatized by the war in Iraq.  We have Rin who served together with her husband.  Jay is killed and Rin finds out she is pregnant.  Shortly after her husband is killed and after she learns she is pregnant she is gang raped and beaten by her brothers in arms. The soldiers are never punished for their actions. Rin returns to Huntsville, N.Y., a small town near Albany where her husband owned a family farm.  She is determined to live their dream of living on the farm and working it.  When her baby, Juney is born, she is blind.  The book hints that the blindness is a result of the rape and beating but does not so conclude. Rin isolates herself on the farm.  She also keeps three wolves illegally.  She defends her property and privacy with her guns.  People are afraid to approach her, and she has a reputation as “the crazy lady” in town.

Beth is the wife of a deployed soldier who has seen several deployments to Iraq.  She is left in Huntsville to raise their troubled son, Flanner, alone.  She lives in a yellow house and hankers to have a relationship with a man to soothe her loneliness.  She tries to hook on to Louis, but though he finds her attractive, he declines to be involved with the wife of a deployed service man.

Louis is a mixed race veteran who has served in Iraq.  He is a very large masculine man who is also sensitive and responsive.  He too has been traumatized by war.  His wife, Melody commits suicide with a gun after he returns.  He blames himself for not picking up the signs of her depression and getting her help. Louis is childless.  He has romantic feelings for Naema.

Naema is an Iraqi doctor with a maimed ten year old son, Tariq.  Her husband was a translator for the American forces.  Because of his role helping the Americans his car is bombed and he is killed.  Tariq near the scene of the bombing is seriously injured at age 3.  He loses his leg above the knee. Naema is a pediatrician who works at the veteran’s clinic that services Rin and Juney.  Still Rin distrusts Naema as “the enemy.”

A hurricane hits Huntsville and many houses are seriously damaged.  This includes Rin’s, Beth’s, and Naema’s houses.  Naema is also seriously injured.  After a near drowning she suffers a serious lung injury and is hospitalized.  Louis takes in Tariq and looks after him.  Tariq fascinated by Rin’s wolves begins visiting Juney where he spends time with a fellow diabled child.  Children at scholl pick on him because of his artificial leg, but Juney does not.  Instead of a disabled or “different” child she just sees a friend.  Both children are sensitive to others and their mothers’ difficulties. Juney serves as a translator for her mother interpreting the feelings of others for her.  Rin has become so defensive and frightened that she cannot read fear and need in others.  Louis who has been sweet on Naema begins repairing her house and visiting her in the hospital assuring her that he has ten year old Tariq in hand.  Tariq was friendly with Flanner before he met Juney, but their friendship has fallen on hard times.  Beth’s husband returns from his deployment.  However, he is different.  Instead of the kind and responsive husband and father he was before, he becomes brutal, mean, violent and cruel.  Beth and Flanner are afraid of him.  Louis runs interference to protect Beth and Flanner by taking Beth’s husband on an extended overnight camping trip.  Beth is left to nurse her black eyes and bruises.  Her husband has been raping her violently.  She can’t wait until he redeploys.  Finally, he is redeployed and is killed in action.  Beth and Flanner are relieved.  They decide to leave Huntsville and start life anew.  Whether they will be successful we do not know.

Rin is arrested for assaulting police officers when they come to cite her for keeping the wolves without a proper license.  WE later learn that she might have qualified for one of the licenses if only she had listened to the police instead of reacting violently.  She has a hair trigger.  However, who can blame her after her experiences in Iraq.  Rin is shot in the leg and is in the jail ward of the hospital where she is being treated for a serious fracture and wounding of her leg.  She is bound to her bed and Juney is placed in foster care.  The book ends with Naema promising to take Juney out of foster care and bringing her to live with her and Tariq.  Rin is grateful.  We also learn that Rin is part of the reason Naema nearly drowned and suffered her serious lung ailment from the hurricane.  It appears Rin running to escape the wrath of the hurricane itself stepped on Naema not caring whether she would hurt her.  All she saw in Naema was “the enemy.”  The shift in relationships where allies become adversaries and enemies become trusted friends is part of what this book is about.

I did not love this book.  I read IT FOR A BOOK CLUB.  It was well written, but I just could not get involved with the characters as much as I would have liked.  I found Naema to be the most sympathetic.  I had difficulty understanding Rin and her motives though she was sympathetic. I also felt the book ended without resolving conflicts.  I would have liked to know what actually happens to Juney, whether Naema and Louis end up in a permanent relationship, and what happens to Beth and Flanner in New York City. It would have been nice to learn how the charges against Rin are resolved.  Though we are left with the hint that the wolves have returned to the wild and at least two of them are alive and well, it would have been nice if there was more than a hint. I don’t like endings where so many things are left in the air. Hence, I cannot heartily recommend this book.