Danielle Trussoni
Falling Through the Earth: A Memoir (2006)
Author: Danielle Trussoni
Genre: Nonfiction (Memoir - Family)
Book Summary:
The story begins in Vietnam at the turn of the 21st century - the author has traveled there as a young adult in order to learn more about her father's experiences in the war, where he was a "tunnel rat." From there we move back in time and place to Wisconsin, 1985, where 11-year-old Danielle Trussoni is running from the police and going to bars with her father, Dan. After her parents divorced, Danielle was the only of the 3 Trussoni children who chose to live with their father - this tale is primarily a memoir of his life, her life and relationship with him, and of the pain that the aftermath of the Vietnam War inflicted on her entire family. The plot line jumps between Dan's experiences in the war, Danielle's childhood (both before and after the divorce), and her life as an adult looking back on her relationship with her father. SPOILER: After the divorce, Danielle's mother quickly remarries. We learn that Dan's best friend in the war, Tommy Goodman, died in a tunnel that was "meant" for Dan to enter - a fact only revealed later in the book. The Trussoni kids learn that they not only have a half-brother and half-sister from their father's previous marriage, but also that their parents gave a baby up for adoption before they got married - this sister, Tracy, enters the picture near the end of the book. Danielle's brother Matt is hit by a car as a child and nearly dies, and her sister Kelly eventually works as a bartender and has a baby on her own at 21. When the author is 15, she decides to move back in with her mother and siblings - we don't learn this fact until the last chapter, but this event had set the stage for a more strained relationship with her father. Dan eventually gets throat cancer, and he and Danielle reconcile; age, sickness, and becoming a grandfather have finally softened him. The story ends with the author, her baby son, and her father at the airport, where they are watching soldiers from the Iraq War be welcomed home.
Geographical Setting: rural Wisconsin; portions are set in Vietnam
Time Period: 1960's-present (alternates continually)
Appeal Characteristics:
There is a great deal to love about this book, and depending on the reader, there could be almost just as much to dislike (see "Red Flags"). This title was named one of the "10 Best Books of 2006" by The New York Times, and was also the winner of the James A. Michener/Copernicus Society of America Award for 2005-2006. Told in very personal first person narration, Trussoni speaks to the reader with such raw honesty and emotion that it feels as though the tale is being confessed by a friend. The writing style is very literary, filled with vivid descriptions and significant imagery, and this memoir truly reads like a novel. Dan Trussoni is as complex a character as one could find in any work of literature - he is utterly flawed and broken, yet the reader never has a hard time understanding why the author loves him so much. He detests shows of emotion or affection, drinks too much, smokes too much, brings strange women home for sex, takes his children to bars, cheats on his wife; the list of offenses is endless. Yet when the author describes his rare moments of weakness and pain, or the emotional traumas he carries with him as a result of the war, we forgive him just as she does. Danielle Trussoni herself is a fascinating character: headstrong, smart, independent yet still seeking approval, she carries the burden of her father's war for her entire life. Rebellious and often neglected, she gets into a lot of trouble as a kid (sex, drugs, drinking, stealing) but eventually cleans up her act. The relationship between father and daughter is almost a contradiction in terms: they are too much alike and thus have trouble getting along, and they sometimes seem to love and hate each other at the same time, in nearly equal measure. Anyone who has a highly complicated relationship with a parent (particularly fathers and daughters) may appreciate and relate to this book. There is a strong focus on characterization here. The plot of the book is completely nonlinear as the author moves seamlessly from tales of her father's tour in Vietnam to her experiences as a child following him around in bars. While in another title, this constant movement could be annoying or confusing, Trussoni's skills as a writer are on display here: it simply feels natural, like we are looking back on her life the way we would our own - in a nonlinear fashion. The Vietnam War is ever-present; the overall tone of the story is one of haunting, an effect primarily derived from the way in which Dan's experiences in the war haunt his life and everyone's life around him. The reader is struck by a strong sense of innocence lost and wasted life as a result of Vietnam; you get the feeling that Dan Trussoni would have been a different man, and a different father, if not for the war. There is a great deal of history about the war itself, sometimes told through the perspective of the Vietnamese museums Danielle visits during her sojourn to that country (her fish-out-of-water trip to Vietnam is yet another appeal trait). The author directly dicussses issues of class related to this war: her father was drafted while other young men were given college deferments. Dan's eventual illness is blamed in part on Agent Orange, and he is finally diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. Anyone looking for a frank and honest discussion of the lasting negative effects of this war will find it here - a not-so-subtle connection is made between the Vietnam and Iraq Wars at the end of the book. Another strong theme of this work is that too much strength and independence can lead to loneliness and isolation ; we see this theme played out by many characters in the book, especially the author and her father. Mrs. Trussoni's sense of "quiet desperation," a reaction to Dan's lack of emotion, eventually drives her to leave her husband, and she is often distanced from Danielle as well. There is an Italian immigrant story here too, as we learn how the Trussonis originally came to settle in Genoa, Wisconsin. The Catholic school experience, and the influence of Catholic beliefs, play a big role in the lives of this family. Despite Catholic beliefs, there are a herd of Trussoni children - some Dan claims as legitimate, some he does not. The author pays particular attention to the relationship eventually developed with her long-long sister Tracy, who was given up for adoption. The time Danielle spends in the bar with her father is at times both nostalgic and depressing; a tightly-knit Midwestern blue collar bar community is a key element in the book. Generally, all of the characters in this story feel like people that you might know and recognize, which is perhaps its greatest strength, and this memoir is a very engrossing work of nonfiction.
Read-alikes: Those seeking another very personal, historically contextualized family memoir might enjoy David Matthews's Ace of Spades. Matthews skillfully and frankly writes about his difficulties growing up as the son of a Jewish mother who abandoned him and a Black Nationalist father, set in 1960's-70's Baltimore; this title was recommended by Trussoni herself. A title that shares Falling Through the Earth's sense of being haunted by the past, as well as a highly literary writing style, is Alice Sebold's memoir, Lucky. Sebold, author of the bestseller The Lovely Bones, describes with surprising candor her rape as a college freshman and its traumatic aftermath. Told by a policeman that she should consider herself "lucky" for having even survived the attack (in much the same way that war veterans must feel), Sebold shares the ways in which this event changed her life, impacted her family, her relationships, and her emotional state. Sebold's memoir is very similar to Trussoni's in its strong female first person narration and honest depiction of post-traumatic stress. For those who were fascinated by tales of the Vietnam war and would like to learn more, Neil Sheehan's A Bright Shining Lie: John Paul Vann and America in Vietnam is an excellent choice. Winner of the 1989 Pulitzer Prize for Nonfiction and the National Book Award, this title presents an investigative journalist's inside look at the war through the eyes of Lt. Col. John Paul Vann - killed in a helicopter crash in Vietnam in 1972, he was an advisor to Saigon in the 1960s and a fierce critic of how the war was fought on both sides. If it's the Vietnam War that interests you, but you'd prefer your tales in doses of fiction, then you should try Tim O'Brien's classic The Things They Carried. Each of the 22 tales portrays the trials and tribulations experienced by a fictional American Vietnam War platoon, told with a great deal of poignancy and infused with honesty based on O'Brien's own war experiences. If you are interested in links between the Vietnam War and Iraq War, a background theme of Trussoni's work, you might want to check out Evan Wright's first-hand account of the early days in Iraq with the First Recon Marine, Generation Kill. Like the highly dangerous missions of Vietnam's tunnel rats, this battalion was nicknamed the "First Suicide Battalion," and its members faced the problems of an uncertain enemy, incompetent leaders, and an unpopular war - traits shared in Vietnam and Iraq. Wright's work was awarded the J. Anthony Lukas Book Prize in 2005. A story that hits on some of the sweetness and sorrow of Trussoni's childhood spent in a bar is J.R. Moehringer's memoir, The Tender Bar. While Trussoni spent time in bars with her father, Moehringer was drawn to the masculinity present in bars because he was looking for a father figure after his dad abandoned him, and the book also describes his relationship with his single mother and unloving grandfather. Told by a male narrator with similar candor about a tough yet loving childhood, filled with similarly complex characters, in the context of a down-on-their-luck but tightly knit bar group, this title has a great deal in common with Trussoni's memoir when it comes to the sentimentality of bar culture.
Red Flags: sex; prostitution; stalking; graphic descriptions and criticism of the Vietnam War; war violence; some family violence; dysfunctional family; drinking/alcoholism; lots of underage drinking, often with parents present; shoplifting; drug use; divorce; miscarriage; adultery; womanizing/misogyny; Catholicism/Catholic school; hunting; racial slurs; use of explicit language (including the f-word), particularly in front of children; excessive smoking; cancer; graphic descriptions of injuries; illegitimate children; giving up a child for adoption; some mention of the Iraq War... and lots more - this title is not for the faint of heart!
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