Title:: [[The Way of Florida]] Authors:: [[Russell Persson]] Tags:: #fiction #historicalfiction Read:: [[2025-03-11]] Instagram :: https://www.instagram.com/p/DHFCrMsORYF/ ## Editions - Edition:: [[Baobab Press]], 2025 - Original Copyright:: 2017 - Pages:: 224 ## Purchase * Bookshop.org:: https://bookshop.org/a/94437/9781936097548 ## Annotations A challenging, but fascinating reading experience. Persson’s novel is a retelling of the 1527 Narváez expedition, when nearly 300 Spanish sailors got lost and separated while exploring the coast of Florida. The expedition spans 8 years with only 4 of the original party surviving.  One of the survivors documented the story in a book called La Relacion, published in 1542. In an interview, Persson describes his retelling “as a kind of armature upon which I could throw strange mud.” Strange is certainly one way to describe the idiom of Persson’s narrator. It can feel at first disjointed and abrupt, but as it teaches you how to engage, it becomes less disruptive and the poetry and musicality of the sentences pop. It demands a lot of attention from the reader, almost like reading a text written in a language you’re just learning. It may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but if you let it unfold like a “current who has a fist,” there just might be brilliance waiting at the end.