Levies of Devotion by Matt Taylor

Levies of Devotion explores the lives of American youths coming of age during the turmoil of the Vietnam War.  Exploring the choices they make in their youth, the book goes on to detail how these choices ripple out to effect their whole lives.

I was really hopeful for this book- I love coming of age stories and I love historical novels, but I just could not love Levies of Devotion.  The book felt clumsy at times and could have benefitted from better editing to ensure that mistakes were edited out, tenses weren't changed arbitrarily and for better clarity.  I also felt that the transition between time periods was often clumsy and I had to work at figuring out "when" we were in the story.

The idea of the story was much more powerful, but I felt that the drama within was written poorly (I'm sorry but I still cannot buy into the "I know I'm only 14 but he's the love of my life" schtick.). I even felt that some of the other romantic entanglements within the book were unnecessary.  There was also this weird passage about virginity at the beginning of the novel that I felt was weird, pretentious and added nothing to the plot.

I really hope the Taylor sticks at his craft because he does have a gift for storytelling, he just needs to refine that talent!