Marilynne Robinson followed Gilead with Home, which presents the same story from the Boughton family’s perspective. But Gilead is so much more: it is a celebration of life, love, friendship, fathers, sons, and forgiveness. The pace is leisurely and conversational, initially masquerading as an amusing portrait of small-town religious life, full of little details like the bizarre Jello salad concoctions served at church suppers. When Jack Boughton returns to Gilead after a long absence, Ames must face long-suppressed emotion and conflict, and accept his inability to control events after he has passed on. Boughton had several children Jack, the black sheep of the family, was named after Ames.
The two have spent years leading Gilead’s faithful, and developed a deep and lasting friendship. But there is one matter that weighs heavily on Ames, and his letter serves as a sort of catharsis.Īmes’ best friend is a Presbyterian minister, Robert Boughton. He mourns his first wife and child, both of whom died too soon, and he rejoices in having found love at an advanced age. Through his writings he tries to come to terms with his strained relationship with his father, now long dead. In it Ames tells his life story, shares hopes and dreams for his wife and son, and explores matters of faith.Īmes was himself the son of a preacher. Now, aware that his heart is failing, he begins writing a long letter to his son, to be read when the son comes of age.
Late in life, he was blessed with a wife and son. John Ames is a Congregationalist minister living in Gilead, a small Iowa town. You may not remember me very well at all, and it may seem to you to be no great thing to have been the good child of an old man in a shabby little town you will no doubt leave behind. I’m writing this in part to tell you that if you ever wonder what you’ve done in your life, and everyone does wonder sooner or later, you have been God’s grace to me, a miracle, something more than a miracle.
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