There are novelists whom I read for the pleasure of their words, others I read for the beauty of the stories, and, if I’m honest, there are some I read simply because I feel like it’s a cultural must (that damned Western Cannon), but then there are novels that I seem drawn to for psychological reasons–often as not with no rational basis. Michelle Huneven’s books fall in this category. I read her to be a better human. I read to find some solace.

Huneven’s novels are positive, weighty things that speak to my psyche. Writing uplifting stories without being cliche is not easy. For every Michelle Huneven there are one hundred Elizabeth Berg’s (Berg, I admit, is a guilty pleasure of mine). I marvel at the way Huneven can make me feel good.

To be sure, Huneven’s stories are not the stuff of fairytale. Her latest Blame traces the life of Patsy MacLemoore from the promise of her early twenties till the twilight of her life. The blame gets assigned early in the story, after MacLemoore kills two innocents (Jehovah’s Witnesses even) while driving drunk. Patsy spends the rest of her life grappling with the guilt and the blame from this accident. These, all too human, forces shape her choice of a mate, her sense of self, her entire sense of purpose.

There is, of course, a twist that comes toward the end of the novel, and this twist leaves the reader wondering, “on what do I base my life, and what if I found that basis was an untruth?”

Intriguing questions. Huneven’s answer is this narrative.

I found Michelle Huneven after reading a interview with her over at that The Millions. What impressed me about Huneven was the way in which she turned the interview into a writing workshop. She sounds more like a counselor than a writer:

“What’s wrong with you, is wrong with your writing,” Huneven told me. “It really behooves you to find out what that is, so that you can disguise that in your writing. Or compensate it, or cover it up. Or cure it, if you can.”

What’s wrong with you is wrong with your writing. This begs the question “what’s wrong with me?” I suffer from extreme bouts of self-doubt. I suffer equally from both stubbornness and malaise. The stubbornness is an absolute commitment to my own worldview. The malaise is a weariness with that very worldview. My irony is often self-destructive. My sense of others (the Other) too little developed. Combine all this together with a deep-seeded perfectionism, and the result is that I’d rather not create. “Why try when it’s only going to be fucked?”

Huneven spoke to me like my analyst. She spoke through her stories. Her other book Jamesland thundered into me like a Summer rain. Jamesland has a silk thread of religion running through it. Religion as examined by the great psychologist William James. Having long ago sloughed off religion, it was inspirational to follow this, extremely non-pedantic, thread back to the source. Notions of community and redemption that I can barely understand outside the strictures of the conservative religious bullshit of my youth came back to me, as if I was seeing them for the first time.

I owe Huneven a debt for this. She has inspired me to be a better writer and to be a better person.

If you can only read one of her books. I’d go for Jamesland