The Wooden Nickel: A Novel Review

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(More customer reviews)The rocky coastline and cold waters of Maine are vividly reflected in the lives of those who bring to life William Carpenter's "The Wooden Nickel." Lucky Lunt is a man somehow outside his own time. A third generation lobsterman, he knows and cares very little about the world outside the waters of Orphan Point, Maine. Lucky knows lobsters, the trucks and boats of everyone within miles by the sound of their engines, county songs on the radio, and stock car racing. But mostly Lucky knows lobsters. He doesn't trust anything or anyone outside the radius of his own interests, and he doesn't understand the changes that life is throwing at him. Old before his time, plagued with a heart that seems hell-bent to quit working, he is losing touch with his children and his wife. Lucky Lunt is a man who's losing touch with life. And life is about to throw Lucky unimaginable curves.
Too many of those curves come in the form of Ronette, not-quite-divorced wife of the man who buys Lucky's lobsters and Lucky's newly hired "sternman." Lucky's wife Sarah, a woman trying to find herself in the art of sea glass mobiles now that her children are leaving home, is wary of the young Ronette and the changes she will bring into there lives. Even Sarah doesn't know the storms ahead, however, and soon Lucky is faced with challenges unimagined in his simple life just a few years before. Lobster harvest wars, the breakup of his family, financial despair and even battles with a rouge whale all become part of Lucky's life. The lobsters aren't the only ones being trapped in the waters of Orphan Point!
The characters of "The Wooden Nickel" are painted with a fine brush and anyone whose even visited the lobster villages of eastern Maine will find familiar ground and peoples populating its pages. Although written in a voice so strong that you'll sometimes smell the bait bags, raw fish and salt spray, the story fluctuates between harsh reality and questionable fancy, especially in the reactions and decisions of the characters within. "The Wooden Nickel" is a classic story of a very ordinary man trying to hold his ground in a rapidly changing and unfamiliar world. Sometimes life isn't what we want, but it's what we get.

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