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Leper
A veteran of World War I, John Severson becomes a school teacher in a tough, working-class St. Paul neighborhood where a high school diploma is a rarity. Severson has dreams, aspirations. But something had happened to him during the war, something awful. And it follows him home and changes every part of his life. John Severson becomes a leper. Instantly he is torn from his dreams, disconnected from his beautiful plan, ripped from the woman he loves. But Severson is determined to reclaim what he lost, to overcome the horror that is leprosy, to dream again.
389 pages, Hardcover
First published June 1, 2008
21 people are currently reading
226 people want to read
About the author
Steve Thayer
23 books69 followersSTEVE THAYER is the New York Times best-selling author of Saint Mudd, Silent Snow, and The Wheat Field. He lives in Edina, Minnesota.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 64 reviews
October 1, 2010
Last night I finished, “The Leper,” and Thayer has restored my faith in modern writers as story tellers.
I tend to avoid modern writers because they simply can’t tell a story properly. The reader is forced to flip back and forth in the book, searching for clues to seldom-referred-to characters or situations (at times I’ve longed for flow charts!). Or we’re “treated” to gory details that serve no useful purpose other than to remind us of the horrendous depths of human depravity…when that same point could easily have been made without leaving images in our brains which led to nightmares. Or – and this is one of my pet peeves – writers write the story in the literal slang or accent of the characters, making it ‘purdy-dern nigh impossible’ to decipher in a flowing manner.
Thayer, on the other hand, is a true story teller. He carried me along through Severson’s life as if I were his relative getting regular updates from him myself. He made his points, but he didn’t cram them down my throat. He made me think about the book during the day while at work and look forward to getting home to read the next section.
I really, really liked the section titles. It’s been ages since I’ve seen something like that. How nice to have that teaser of a title there to prepare me for what was coming, to keep me entranced.
My only complaint is that the editor needs to pay much better attention. I found simple editing errors throughout, to the point that I went back to see which publisher he used, wondering to myself how on earth a publisher could miss so many mistakes!
I note a few here:
Pg. 268 “He took the killing personal.”
Pg. 288 “Each new kiss grew a little bit longer and little less chaste.”
Pg. 316 “I think I know whose behind the killings.”
Pg. 332 “She couldn’t of given us leprosy.”
I tend to avoid modern writers because they simply can’t tell a story properly. The reader is forced to flip back and forth in the book, searching for clues to seldom-referred-to characters or situations (at times I’ve longed for flow charts!). Or we’re “treated” to gory details that serve no useful purpose other than to remind us of the horrendous depths of human depravity…when that same point could easily have been made without leaving images in our brains which led to nightmares. Or – and this is one of my pet peeves – writers write the story in the literal slang or accent of the characters, making it ‘purdy-dern nigh impossible’ to decipher in a flowing manner.
Thayer, on the other hand, is a true story teller. He carried me along through Severson’s life as if I were his relative getting regular updates from him myself. He made his points, but he didn’t cram them down my throat. He made me think about the book during the day while at work and look forward to getting home to read the next section.
I really, really liked the section titles. It’s been ages since I’ve seen something like that. How nice to have that teaser of a title there to prepare me for what was coming, to keep me entranced.
My only complaint is that the editor needs to pay much better attention. I found simple editing errors throughout, to the point that I went back to see which publisher he used, wondering to myself how on earth a publisher could miss so many mistakes!
I note a few here:
Pg. 268 “He took the killing personal.”
Pg. 288 “Each new kiss grew a little bit longer and little less chaste.”
Pg. 316 “I think I know whose behind the killings.”
Pg. 332 “She couldn’t of given us leprosy.”
August 20, 2013
Fascinating juxaposed against Molokai I am torn as to which book I loved more. Both are incredibly haunting. I was in tears by the end of The Leper, seriously I seem to be drawn to books about insiders and outsiders, and if a leper isn't the quintessential outsider I can't think of anyone more deserving of the title. This is a fast paced, sometimes incredible story of one man's journey to find peace and serenity after being diagnosed with leprosy. His heroic tale is simply fantastic as he travels from World War I France, to Minnesota, and then to a leprosarium in Louisiana by the name of Carville, to the famed island of Molokai. This book is hauntingly beautiful.
May 8, 2018
You can't have a leper as the hero?
A fascinating telling of the abusive treatment and effective life imprisonment and/or extrajudicial killings doled out to lepers in the US in the twentieth century. Recounted by an almost mythical character spanning the period from the end of the Great War to the Regan presidency. The story was gripping, the sense of injustice all enveloping and the ultimate conclusion both inspiring and year jerking. I highly recommend this book
A fascinating telling of the abusive treatment and effective life imprisonment and/or extrajudicial killings doled out to lepers in the US in the twentieth century. Recounted by an almost mythical character spanning the period from the end of the Great War to the Regan presidency. The story was gripping, the sense of injustice all enveloping and the ultimate conclusion both inspiring and year jerking. I highly recommend this book
August 6, 2011
Heartbreaking story about shunned, despised people who lose all their rights. They cease to exist in the eyes of the public.
December 5, 2018
Kudos to the author who tackled a taboo subject and turned it into a well-written, informative story. I laughed, cried, and thoroughly enjoyed the rich tapestry of characters, history, and locales all blended into a book you cannot miss! My Kindle version was well-edited and easy to read. Please put more of your books on Kindle Unlimited, Mr Thayer!
July 14, 2022
Put it down after page 66. I was unpleasantly surprised by a turn in the story. A sexual relationship between a 30ish schoolteacher and his 17/18 year old student?? Depicted in a romanticized way? Am I supposed to feel intrigued or aroused by this? Well I don't. 🤢 I guess I should have read the inside cover first.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 3, 2021
This was another re-read for me. I first read this book in high school. Reading this again as an adult, a lot of things hit me differently and I was able to pick up on some of the more questionable things that were happening. This was a way more emotional book for me this time around.
If Mr. Severson was really worried about being fired for dating one of his students, he had a funny way of showing it. At least one of his fellow teachers at the high school knew he had feels for Bernice, and it kind of sounded like the principal may have been on to it as well. Not to mention picking her up on his bike and giving her rides (they could hear people talking about them as they went past). And having sex in his classroom during prom . . . Not the smartest decisions.
I think it was pretty stupid of Severson to sneak into the school after he was diagnosed to 'say goodbye' to his students. Rather he was contagious or not, he shouldn’t have pushed his luck with spreading the disease throughout the school. Although, at that point, if he was going to spread it to any of his students it could have been to late by then.
I’m confused. First Doc said that leprosy runs in families, and later he said that it was rare for a child born from leper parents to have the disease. Also, from what I read as I continued, there doesn’t seem to be much of a connection with families. There is no mention of anyone on the island being related (besides for Michael and his military veteran father). Was Doc simply mistaken about his ‘family tie’ theory or did the author simply decide not to explore this idea much.
After receiving the letter that his mother had died, Severson escapes from the camp and starts to head back home. It makes me slightly concerned about how he doesn’t seem to be worried and even cares if he will effect anybody else with leprosy. I mean, he just walks down the road in New Orleans, stopping at street vendors and at a cafe (not to mention the club where he got beat up). Doc told Severson once that most of the people at the leper camp didn’t know how they caught the disease. THIS IS HOW THEY CAUGHT IT. From some idiot sitting a couple tables away from them in a restaurant or passing someone that has it on the street, and yet Severson doesn't seem to care in the slightest if anyone else around him gets sick.
I had forgotten that Severson had raped Sheri. I understand he was angry over everything that he has been through (diagnosed positive for leprosy, treated like a prisoner in the camp, getting beat up after attempting to escape, and then getting attacked by Sheri with a knife), but hurting Sheri in THIS way was not going to help his situation. Although he did technically rape Bernice too (by modern day standards anyways). He did have sex with a minor. Was this considered rape back in the early 1900s?
I don’t know if Sheri was in denial or what, but she did not act like someone who was raped by Severson. Going back to visit with him after just a couple weeks? Having 'real' sex with him? Shouldn’t she be avoiding him or at the very least not wanting him to touch her? Just because she is a whore doesn’t mean she doesn’t have the right to say ‘no’ and she did. “She slapped him as hard as she could. ‘You’ll have to kill me first,’ she yelled in defiance. ‘You’ll be fuckin’ my dead body’” (189). They seemed to have started dating after this as well.
It was annoying how clueless Severson could be about some stuff. For example, when Doc admitted to him that he wasn’t attracted to women, Severson (shocked) questioned him about his age, apparently assuming that the reason Doc wasn’t attracted to women was because he was to young. Doc is old enough to have graduated from university. It has nothing to do with age . . . Also, when Sheri started randomly asking him questions about kids being born from leper parents and how that would effect them, did he really think that she was just curious. He didn’t even think to ask her why she wanted to know? He could have done something more to help her if he had known that she was pregnant, and may have been able to protect her from the hospital staff too. There were several points in this book where I wanted to shake some common sense into this man.
Severson really does have a thing for younger woman, huh? Not only did he date (and was engaged to) Bernice, but then 22 years after dropping off the little girl with golden hair with the nuns, she shows up at the Molokai leper settlement and THEY hook up.
This quote shocked me: “Alcoholism plagued the village, and Severson could do little to curb it. What he did curb, and some said with an unholy vengeance, was assault and battery. Property damage. Theft. And most importantly, rape” (289). This coming from the man that had sex and was engaged to a minor and raped a whore, but God forbid if anybody else rapes someone . . .
Pee Wee (aka Peter Waimea) was Severson’s deputy and a good friend of his. The guy had one of the worse cases of leprosy and was suffering. Why would Severson refuse to help Pee Wee end his life when he was suffering like this and barely breathing anyways?? Severson wouldn’t help him, so Pee Wee apparently found someone else to drag him out of the hospital and he died being eating alive by pigs. This was a terrible way to go, but he had asked Severson for help first. Instead of being furious for the way Pee Wee died, he should have found a more humane way to but the poor guy out of his misery. No one deserves to spend their last days in this kind of pain.
Did Peter Waimea not tell his doctors/nurses that he wanted to be put out of his misery?? I mean, they allowed Severson to continue with his treatments that they warned him several times could be killing him and he says, "Dead or alive, I’m through with leprosy” (320). If Severson has the right to tell the doctors to continue with a treatment that they advice him to stop because it is hurting him, Pee Wee should have had the right to ask them to end his suffering when he was in that amount of pain.
I loved the ending of this book. It reminded me of the end of the movie, Titanic, when after Rose passed away, she returned to the ship where everyone that had died that night were their to welcome her (including Jack). The only difference was that instead of just passing by his fellow lepers that he lived with in the camps, he was visited by everyone he had known in his live and was important to him in someway. The last scene, with Severson seeing the light and his 'wife', Bernice, told him that it was time to go . . . It was a nice way to end his lives journey.
If Mr. Severson was really worried about being fired for dating one of his students, he had a funny way of showing it. At least one of his fellow teachers at the high school knew he had feels for Bernice, and it kind of sounded like the principal may have been on to it as well. Not to mention picking her up on his bike and giving her rides (they could hear people talking about them as they went past). And having sex in his classroom during prom . . . Not the smartest decisions.
I think it was pretty stupid of Severson to sneak into the school after he was diagnosed to 'say goodbye' to his students. Rather he was contagious or not, he shouldn’t have pushed his luck with spreading the disease throughout the school. Although, at that point, if he was going to spread it to any of his students it could have been to late by then.
I’m confused. First Doc said that leprosy runs in families, and later he said that it was rare for a child born from leper parents to have the disease. Also, from what I read as I continued, there doesn’t seem to be much of a connection with families. There is no mention of anyone on the island being related (besides for Michael and his military veteran father). Was Doc simply mistaken about his ‘family tie’ theory or did the author simply decide not to explore this idea much.
After receiving the letter that his mother had died, Severson escapes from the camp and starts to head back home. It makes me slightly concerned about how he doesn’t seem to be worried and even cares if he will effect anybody else with leprosy. I mean, he just walks down the road in New Orleans, stopping at street vendors and at a cafe (not to mention the club where he got beat up). Doc told Severson once that most of the people at the leper camp didn’t know how they caught the disease. THIS IS HOW THEY CAUGHT IT. From some idiot sitting a couple tables away from them in a restaurant or passing someone that has it on the street, and yet Severson doesn't seem to care in the slightest if anyone else around him gets sick.
I had forgotten that Severson had raped Sheri. I understand he was angry over everything that he has been through (diagnosed positive for leprosy, treated like a prisoner in the camp, getting beat up after attempting to escape, and then getting attacked by Sheri with a knife), but hurting Sheri in THIS way was not going to help his situation. Although he did technically rape Bernice too (by modern day standards anyways). He did have sex with a minor. Was this considered rape back in the early 1900s?
I don’t know if Sheri was in denial or what, but she did not act like someone who was raped by Severson. Going back to visit with him after just a couple weeks? Having 'real' sex with him? Shouldn’t she be avoiding him or at the very least not wanting him to touch her? Just because she is a whore doesn’t mean she doesn’t have the right to say ‘no’ and she did. “She slapped him as hard as she could. ‘You’ll have to kill me first,’ she yelled in defiance. ‘You’ll be fuckin’ my dead body’” (189). They seemed to have started dating after this as well.
It was annoying how clueless Severson could be about some stuff. For example, when Doc admitted to him that he wasn’t attracted to women, Severson (shocked) questioned him about his age, apparently assuming that the reason Doc wasn’t attracted to women was because he was to young. Doc is old enough to have graduated from university. It has nothing to do with age . . . Also, when Sheri started randomly asking him questions about kids being born from leper parents and how that would effect them, did he really think that she was just curious. He didn’t even think to ask her why she wanted to know? He could have done something more to help her if he had known that she was pregnant, and may have been able to protect her from the hospital staff too. There were several points in this book where I wanted to shake some common sense into this man.
Severson really does have a thing for younger woman, huh? Not only did he date (and was engaged to) Bernice, but then 22 years after dropping off the little girl with golden hair with the nuns, she shows up at the Molokai leper settlement and THEY hook up.
This quote shocked me: “Alcoholism plagued the village, and Severson could do little to curb it. What he did curb, and some said with an unholy vengeance, was assault and battery. Property damage. Theft. And most importantly, rape” (289). This coming from the man that had sex and was engaged to a minor and raped a whore, but God forbid if anybody else rapes someone . . .
Pee Wee (aka Peter Waimea) was Severson’s deputy and a good friend of his. The guy had one of the worse cases of leprosy and was suffering. Why would Severson refuse to help Pee Wee end his life when he was suffering like this and barely breathing anyways?? Severson wouldn’t help him, so Pee Wee apparently found someone else to drag him out of the hospital and he died being eating alive by pigs. This was a terrible way to go, but he had asked Severson for help first. Instead of being furious for the way Pee Wee died, he should have found a more humane way to but the poor guy out of his misery. No one deserves to spend their last days in this kind of pain.
Did Peter Waimea not tell his doctors/nurses that he wanted to be put out of his misery?? I mean, they allowed Severson to continue with his treatments that they warned him several times could be killing him and he says, "Dead or alive, I’m through with leprosy” (320). If Severson has the right to tell the doctors to continue with a treatment that they advice him to stop because it is hurting him, Pee Wee should have had the right to ask them to end his suffering when he was in that amount of pain.
I loved the ending of this book. It reminded me of the end of the movie, Titanic, when after Rose passed away, she returned to the ship where everyone that had died that night were their to welcome her (including Jack). The only difference was that instead of just passing by his fellow lepers that he lived with in the camps, he was visited by everyone he had known in his live and was important to him in someway. The last scene, with Severson seeing the light and his 'wife', Bernice, told him that it was time to go . . . It was a nice way to end his lives journey.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 28, 2019
SPOILER ALERT: If you're looking for a book with a happy ending - this is not the book for you. If you're looking for a book that takes you on an incredible roller coaster of emotions - this IS the book for you. I would not call this book "historical fiction" but as the author points out at the end of the book, the two leper "sanatoriums" were/are real. The one in Louisiana closed but the one on Moloki is now a national park and a few people still live there. It's impossible to not feel for John - his life is going along so well and then he's diagnosed with what we now call Hansen's disease, was once called leprosy and thought to be highly contagious (it wasn't until the 1970's that this was finally debunked). As he is forced to leave his home town, his mother and the job and students he loves, he is exiled to first Louisiana and then Hawaii. We stay with John through his lifetime and see him eventually come to accept his life and even become a prominent individual once in Hawaii. Truly beautifully written, I realize this book is not for everyone, but I was hooked from the start and do recommend.
April 11, 2019
The title says it all. A WWI soldier and his troops become lost in the woods in enemy territory. There they come across a mysterious village. It was a leper colony. Years after the war, the soldier goes to college and becomes a math teacher at his home town high school. When everything looks wonderful, the leprosy is diagnosed and his whole world is changed forever.
This novel is unlike any I have read in a long time. It is lovely and sweet then heartbreaking. I can easily place myself in the past. A silent witnessed to one man's journey through a life threatening illness and isolation. In truth, it is hard to put yourself in the hero's shoes because it is too frightening to even contemplate his life. The term leper brings to mind Biblical illness long thought erased. To realize it exists and destroyed so many lives. The basic civil rights taken away from someone who is ill. Not a criminal. Not a bad person. Someone who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. A person who could be us. This is a novel that will make you think. I could easily seeing The Leper being an excellent book for discussion. So many avenues to explore. So many questions to ask.
This novel is unlike any I have read in a long time. It is lovely and sweet then heartbreaking. I can easily place myself in the past. A silent witnessed to one man's journey through a life threatening illness and isolation. In truth, it is hard to put yourself in the hero's shoes because it is too frightening to even contemplate his life. The term leper brings to mind Biblical illness long thought erased. To realize it exists and destroyed so many lives. The basic civil rights taken away from someone who is ill. Not a criminal. Not a bad person. Someone who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. A person who could be us. This is a novel that will make you think. I could easily seeing The Leper being an excellent book for discussion. So many avenues to explore. So many questions to ask.
May 18, 2025
As I was reading it, I couldn't figure out just what this book was. A sad tale of a very unfortunate man? A history of man's ignorance of leprosy? A tale of love and perseverance? A parallel to so many stories of man's mistreatment of their fellow man? I've never read a more unpredictable book. If fact, nothing predictable happened in this book. It took the reader from St. Paul to Louisiana, Panama, and Hawaii. It included two world wars, several murders, personal loss, and a tale of revenge. I have never read a book like this before. I still don't know what possessed the author to choose leprosy as topic for his book. The story was difficult to read at times, but it is so well written that I just had to keep going.
March 31, 2022
Great story. I’ve never read a book quite like this.
The story is interesting and takes you along with it.
Lots of action and you do learn quite a bit about leprosy, but the book is a thrilling adventure story.
Don’t pass this one up.
The story is interesting and takes you along with it.
Lots of action and you do learn quite a bit about leprosy, but the book is a thrilling adventure story.
Don’t pass this one up.
May 6, 2017
Very good
July 18, 2017
Good book. Parts of it are set in the East St. Paul/Harding High School area so that made it interesting to read his descriptions of places I've grown up around.
April 10, 2018
Moving story
I was drawn into the life of John Severenson felt his loss and his triumphs. Never have I been so engrossed in someone's life story as his.
I was drawn into the life of John Severenson felt his loss and his triumphs. Never have I been so engrossed in someone's life story as his.
April 18, 2018
The Leper - The story is a very interesting one.
This was an amazing story about leprosy! To think that a disease from the Bible is still in existence today!
This was an amazing story about leprosy! To think that a disease from the Bible is still in existence today!
October 13, 2018
Steve Thayer nailed another one. I loved this book.
August 22, 2019
Fantastic historical fiction!!
Outstanding! Amazing! Detailed review soon! You’ll want to read this book immediately! I will be reading more books by this author!
Outstanding! Amazing! Detailed review soon! You’ll want to read this book immediately! I will be reading more books by this author!
November 30, 2021
I read this book may years ago. It was outstanding!!!
March 23, 2013
Although I am not fond of writing a negative review, (I am guided mostly by the classic questions:is it true? is it kind? is it necessary?) I feel compelled to do this. I was drawn to this novel as it was recommended in another's review of Molokai by Alan Brennert, a book that I liked very much. This book, on the other hand, did nothing but disappoint; at times causing me to roll my eyes in response to the cliched writing, the trite similes and short, choppy, boring sentences. I can't believe this book actually had an editor. It felt to me like the first draft of a novel written by a high school student. So one might ask, why did you continue to read it? Good question. The storyline was compelling enough for me to need to know what happened in the end. Am I glad I stuck to it? Not really. I am none the richer for having read this novel. I didn't really learn anything from it except perhaps how NOT to write.
I think my main issue with the book was the main character, John Eric Severson, "the School teacher" "The former marine", "the leper" "the mathematics teacher" , and all the other nameless ways he was addressed by the author. He really lacked flesh and bones. Although he was meant to be the protagonist in the novel, he, in my opinion, had no redeeming qualities. I just couldn't like or dislike him, as he had no personality. And although he was meant to be incredibly handsome, I could never picture him as such, as a matter of fact, i couldn't really picture him at all.
The story line although compelling enough to drag me to its dragged out ending, was really too far fetched to be given any real credibility. My eyes really did roll on many occasions. As the kids, say, whatever.
In closing, would i recommend this book? Not to anyone I know and like. If you have read The Island by Victoria Hislop, or The Pearl Diver by Jeffrey Talarigo, or the aforementioned Molokai, and want to read another engaging novel about lives lived with leprosy, don't expect the same kind of enjoyment from this novel as from those. You won't get it. Maybe men would enjoy it more than other women. Who knows. I just know that had I not read it, I would not have been lacking in any way.
I think my main issue with the book was the main character, John Eric Severson, "the School teacher" "The former marine", "the leper" "the mathematics teacher" , and all the other nameless ways he was addressed by the author. He really lacked flesh and bones. Although he was meant to be the protagonist in the novel, he, in my opinion, had no redeeming qualities. I just couldn't like or dislike him, as he had no personality. And although he was meant to be incredibly handsome, I could never picture him as such, as a matter of fact, i couldn't really picture him at all.
The story line although compelling enough to drag me to its dragged out ending, was really too far fetched to be given any real credibility. My eyes really did roll on many occasions. As the kids, say, whatever.
In closing, would i recommend this book? Not to anyone I know and like. If you have read The Island by Victoria Hislop, or The Pearl Diver by Jeffrey Talarigo, or the aforementioned Molokai, and want to read another engaging novel about lives lived with leprosy, don't expect the same kind of enjoyment from this novel as from those. You won't get it. Maybe men would enjoy it more than other women. Who knows. I just know that had I not read it, I would not have been lacking in any way.
July 1, 2009
After having lived on Molokai, and read the book by the same name, this title caught my eye in the library. It is wonderfully written, a story of a man who as a Marine during WWI came in contact with leprosy and unbenownst to him he had contracted a mild, latent form of the disease. When he finally gets to teach Math in Harding High School in St. Paul Minnesota he is in his element. Finds hope and shares it with kids that might never have had a chance in life, gives them a reason to graduate and do something with their lives...etc. He falls hopelessly in love with one of his female students and they secretly get engaged to marry, not to expose the news until after the graduation. But that is derailed. The news of his possible exposure to leprosy in the war sends the officials to the school to "capture" him and send him off to the encampment for lepers in Louisiana - no mail, no contact of any kind with people other than those in the colony with leprosy. The world is filled with fright about this disease and "suspects", pretty much anyone who MIGHT have had contact with leprosy is taken into this colony and kept away from the rest of the world. Big floods, swamps, difficult to escape...KKKlan watching over the colony and ordered to shoot anyone trying to escape...fascinating story, and of course sad for the people stuck there unable to make contact with their friends and families back home...The marine later ends up on Molokai, in the Kalaupapa leper colony there, as Sheriff. But he never forgets his beloved fiance, Bernice...Definitely a good read!
January 8, 2013
This is the story of a WWI soldier who contracts leprosy in Europe, becomes a dedicated and popular high schoolteacher in the Twin Cities before his symptoms present, then is committed to a leper colony near New Orleans and finally to Molokai, where he spends the remainder of his life as sheriff of the leper colony. The story held my interest despite amateurish writing--excessive melodrama, a death by violence body count to rival Shakespeare, and terrible sex scene writing, besides just a general inconsistent and inelegant style--and even more amateurish copyediting and proofreading, with frequent misspelled homonyms and inaccurate use of apostrophes and punctuation. This is not to mention that the author's fundamental point, that leprosy is barely contagious, is undermined from the outset by basing the story on 3 soldiers who had incidental contact with lepers in Europe all contracting the disease. Anyone interested in reading fiction about this topic would be better served by reading more subtle Moloka'i by Alan Brennert.
January 5, 2014
This was a difficult book to start. Knowing what was to come, from the title and book jacket, made the beginning very bitter sweet. The protagonist is a difficult person to like because he makes some pretty selfish and immoral choices. Maybe that makes him more real. However, once I reached the point in the story where he is diagnosed, the book became difficult to put down. This is the first novel about leprosy that I have read, and it was interesting. One thing that struck me after finishing the book is how are fears doom us to repeat the mistakes we should have learned from in history.
December 20, 2008
I love the author so picked this book up right away. There are a few aspects of this book which seemed ridiculous and over the top (towards the end--I won't spoil anything) but the story of the leper's life is a tragic but hopeful one as he goes from WWII back to Minnesota to Louisiana to Hawaii. At times, it was tough to read but a great story overall. Just don't expect a warm, happy, uplifting book here.
January 4, 2009
Another good book by a Minnesota author. When I was a young girl, I read with fascination the story of Father Damien and his love of the people stricken with leprosy and his work to help them. This book, although fiction, seems so historically correct. The main character unknowingly contacts leprosy during his stint in the Marines in WW1 and we learn of all the terrible struggles he and others like him had to endure.
June 16, 2009
a wonderful story of a Minnesota World War I soldier contracting leprosy and the life he lives after that diagnosis- I love this author-I never get the feeling like I do with some authors that he is writing for the money or to be commercial. He has written some excellent books and I would recommend them to almost anyone. This is a book you should pick up when you have some free time because you will not want to stop.
June 23, 2014
Overall a really good read. There were parts that I felt were a bit unbelievable, just like some TV shows where the good guy survives a hale of bullets, non of which come close to hitting him. But all in all I found it fascinating and at times couldn't put it down. The author obviously had done lots of research about leprosy and the settlement in Hawaii. Would recommend it to anyone interested in this subject.
November 5, 2008
Never expected what I got fromthis book. All we have to do is here "leper" and we shudder in fear. thayer paints a picture of what life was like in almost modern times. Who knew what are country did to these people? Read, it will intrigue you. May not be the best written book, but is a though provoking issue, even today.
December 15, 2008
I devoured this book over a weekend. It's one of those that you think, "One more chapter" then next thing you know, it's been 2 hours of reading. Steve has a knack for telling a story, though sometimes he can get a bit more graphic than I care for. Would you ever imagine rooting for a leper? His story makes you feel empathy and yet you feel the main character's rage. Good one.
December 31, 2008
Interesting. Basicly a love story and the plight of a man having to leave his home and everyone he loves when it is discovered that he has leprosy. I'm sure alot of research went into this book and there are quite a few interesting facts that one would not be familiar with.
It was exciting and moved along quickly. I have read this author before and will again.
It was exciting and moved along quickly. I have read this author before and will again.
November 24, 2009
A compelling read about courage and survival in the face of physical, moral and political adversity. Well developed characters that make you care about how their lives will turn out and no "giveaways" or predictable endings to tie up everything in a neat and precise bow. This book tugged at my heart in the best of ways -by telling a believable story set within a real phase of our history.
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