Why "Where the Crawdads Sing" Remains a Bestseller
*Spoiler Alerts Ahead
The story Delia Owens tells in Where the Crawdads Sing is not a new tale: the social outcast blamed for a crime they did not commit, the atrocity of male violence and the heart break of first love. Yet, Owen’s nature writing crowns the story with a fresh and beautiful perspective- that of the marsh.
The immense popularity of Where the Crawdads Sing, which has been on the New York Times best-seller list for over 45 weeks now, stems from the macro-level narrative it represents. The story takes place in North Carolina in the late 60’s and reflects the prejudiced culture of that time and place. As represented by Owens, the past holds an unfavorable view of social outcasts such as “The Marsh Girl”. These outsiders were the targets of injustice, which culminates in the novel as Kya is wrongly accused of murder. Not only is she arrested with no evidence, but is abused and nearly raped by the white man whose murder they blame her for.
It is a narrative about loneliness. About someone who is looked down upon, bullied, and made fun of, which is all too relatable for most people. But the story triumphs for another reason other than its relatable loneliness: it is the triumph out of this loneliness, the outcast with special talents who proves to be a better and more talented human than the civilized persons around them. This is the narrative reflected in our own cultural moment. It is a traditional narrative overturned, and the outsider becomes the hero.
We see how Kya functions in her own world as a different kind of species than the one produced in the town beside her. Her attachment to and command over the Marsh is what makes her interesting, it is what makes her better. And the descriptions of the marsh and her life inside of it are what bring the narrative to life. Owens, who is well-known for her non-fiction nature writing in Africa, is easily able to transport an audience into the world on her pages and it is one of the strongest aspects of the book- but it is also what confines her story to the genre of “beach reads”.
When the setting carries the story, the escalation of plot fails to coincide with the tempo of description and the story becomes one that could be re-continued at any time. Following the current trend for summer reads this year, the narrative successfully oscillates between past and present, yet, it still leads us down a path to an obvious conclusion, one that isn’t any less satisfying for its predictability: Kya is found innocent and the social outcast triumphs despite all odds.