Stiltsville

Dec 21, 2011 by Keetha DePriest

Stiltsville by Susanna Daniel is one of the best books I’ve read this year, and yet I don’t know that I can explain what made it so fantastic. It’s said only a handful of plots exist that tell every story. The difference is the storyteller and how she creates the characters and setting, how she brings an old story to life and makes us care. Susanna Daniel has not written a thriller, but a quiet book about a family, a woman, friendship, ties and love, about things left unsaid.

Frances Ellerby and Dennis Duval are ordinary people who are not thrust in extraordinary circumstance. Frances, given to quicksilver emotions, falls in love with Dennis and begins her family life in a community of stilt houses in Biscayne Bay. Played out against the changes in south Florida from the late 1960s to the 1990s, Frances changes from that impulsive girl to a wise woman, still entirely recognizable as herself.

From the book jacket:

One sunny morning in 1969, near the end of her first trip to Miami, twenty-six-year-old Frances Ellerby finds herself in a place called Stiltsville, a community of houses built on pilings in the middle of Biscayne Bay.

It’s the first time the Atlanta native has been out on the open water, and she’s captivated. On the dock of a stilt house, with the dazzling skyline in the distance and the unknowable ocean beneath her, she meets the house’s owner, Dennis DuVal—and a new future reveals itself.

Turning away from her quiet, predictable life back home, Frances moves to Miami to be with Dennis. Over time, she earns the confidence of his wild-at-heart sister and wins the approval of his oldest friend. Frances and Dennis marry and have a child—but rather than growing complacent about their good fortune, they continue to face the challenges of intimacy and the complicated city they call home.

Stiltsville is the family’s island oasis—until suddenly it’s gone, and Frances is forced to figure out how to make her family work on dry land. Against a backdrop of lush tropical beauty, Frances and Dennis struggle with the mutability of love and Florida’s weather, as well as temptation, chaos, and disappointment. But just when Frances thinks she’s reached some semblance of higher ground, she must confront an obstacle so great that even the lessons she’s learned about navigating the uncharted waters of family life can’t keep them afloat.

With Stiltsville, Susanna Daniel weaves the beauty, violence, and humanity of Miami’s coming-of-age with an enduring story of a marriage’s beginning, maturity, and heartbreaking demise.

Before I learned Susanna Daniel grew up in Miami, spending most of her childhood in a stilt house on Biscayne Bay, I knew she had to have to known the area and its nuances intimately. I could all but smell the sunscreen and feel the grit of sand against my sunburned shoulder.

I read an interview with Daniel where she said, “What I hoped to illuminate in the novel is the magical in the ordinary.” She is a most able magician, her lyrical style keeping the reader focused on this simple story of one woman’s life.

What I wanted to know was why everyone wasn’t talking about this book. I felt  like I discovered a sleeper hit. As it turns out, the book was an Oprah pick for its 2011 Summer Reading List, Amazon.com listed it as among the best books of August 2011, and Barnes & Noble named Stiltsville to its Discover Great New Writers list.

Though I somehow missed the talk about this novel, I am grateful to have discovered it on my own.  It’s a beauty.

Overall rating: ******

Unboxed rating: *****

Keetha DePriest loves the small southern town that nourishes her and her family, and is grateful that through books, she can visit Paris or New York or Brakebills Academy, exploring other worlds, lives and ideas. Keetha is the author of two books about cooking and is working on her second novel. She rarely watches TV as that would take time away from reading books.

Keetha DePriest

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