The Auctioneer

The Auctioneer is having a bit of a renaissance at the moment. Much lauded at the time of its release, the untimely death of its author left it being forgotten before a string of recent rereleases have brought it back into the discussion. This is a classic take on the city versus countryside. Set in small town rural America, it plays on the sense of community that is present in those type of places and the ease there is for it to be abused.

In this story we follow a family living on the edge of a farming community. When a slick city person moves to town and asks for donations for an auction to raise money for improving the police force, they donate generously. This community spirit becomes the mechanism of self destruction in the end as the levers of power are gradually coopted by the newcomers and the community ripped apart.

This is a slow burner of a novel. It focuses very much on the horror that humans can do to one another, how easy it is for institutions to be corrupted. Clever in its own way, it unfortunately did not really hit the spot for me. I can respect what it does, but it was just a bit too slow for me.