A Story of Hardship and Redemption - an Editorial Review of "Through Our Own Wrong Eyes"

Book Blurb:

If only we could see...

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Dustbowl Colorado 1930s. At 26, Paul had ridden the rails in search of work for years and now has returned to his hometown in Lamar. There he meets Ruby,14, whose innocence bolsters his confidence. Because she sees him as more than the alcohol abuser man of many get rich dreams, she marries him and begins writing a journal that spans over 40 years.

This is the fictionalized story of that remarkable journal. From Depression Era Colorado through the California aviation industrialization boom of WW2 to new beginnings in Arkansas, the story follows the tumultuous lives of two mismatched people as they struggle to see each other and the rapidly changing world as they really are, and not through the clouded lens of ego, abuse and domination.

Ultimately, this is a story of faithfulness when it is not warranted, courage when it is not expected and redemption through perseverance. It will not disappoint.

Book Buy Link: https://geni.us/wYcAM

Editorial Review:

Title: Through Our Own Wrong Eyes

Author: Florence D’Angelo

Rating: 4.2

“Through Our Own Wrong Eyes” by Florence D’Angelo, follows Ruby Blevins and Paul Oscar Wybrant, a young couple who marry in Colorado and whose lives are marked by poverty, addiction, and demands of the land itself. The novel looks at what keeps two people together when the feelings that first drew them have worn thin, when love becomes a series of choices made daily and often without thanks.

“The sun blazed upon the still waters and the day was dry, as days usually were in Lamar in the middle of the great drought of the mid-1930s. She stepped out of the car and raised her hand to shield her blue eyes against the sparkling glare of the small lake. “It surely is a pretty place…”

This moment occurs on Ruby and Paul’s first date at a picnic at his favorite fishing spot near Lamar, Colorado. The reader feels the careful innocence of the scene in the way Ruby moves closer on the truck seat but only a few inches and in the way he watches her remove her shoes at the water’s edge. The scene establishes the imbalance that will define their early years- Paul’s experience and Ruby’s youthfulness, his need to be admired and her willingness to provide that admiration. The reader who meets them here, shy and hopeful will measure every subsequent hardship they encounter later against this beginning.

“Ruby, I know what I have to do. I have to go back. Not in the summer when we had planned. Now. I need to do this. I swear to you, I promise with all my heart that I won’t drink anymore. Please give me one more chance. You’ll be shed of me for good.’”

This moment occurs in California after Paul has been found crawling across the street, too drunk to stand. Ruby has told him she cannot live with his addiction anymore, and the reader feels the exhaustion in her silence. The scene captures the novel’s central struggle, not between husband and wife but within Paul Oscar himself, a man who knows what he must do and doubts whether he can do it. You feel that the farm in Arkansas, the land he will buy and clear and plant will be a test, where he will need to prove something, to Ruby, to himself, and to the sons who have watched him fail. His promise carries the weight of a last chance, and the reader feels the fragility of it.

“A letter from Oscar came and she reread it several times though her falling tears and shaking hands made it difficult to make out his neat script by the third reading… She placed the damp pages carefully on the table and smoothed out the wrinkles as best she could as if that would soothe him as much as it soothed her to do it. Who was he trying to convince? Him or me?”

This moment occurs in Arkansas while Paul Oscar is away, building the farmhouse alone through the winter. Ruby is alone with her thoughts, and the letter from her faraway son offers a philosophy of acceptance that she cannot quite embrace. The reader senses the parallel between mother and son, both bound to spouses who cannot give them what they need, and both searching for meaning in circumstances they did not choose. Ruby’s question, who is he trying to convince, cuts to the heart of the novel’s concern with self-deception.

D’Angelo has written a tale that spans decades, and one whose writing moves with the rhythm of ordinary life, grounding the story in the details of pig farrowing, tar paper roofs, and the endless work of canning vegetables for a winter that always comes too soon. The structure follows the arc of a marriage, not from romance to ruin but from what emerges as a need to something harder and more durable, a bond forged in shared labor rather than shared passion. The book features characters who are defined by what they endure and by the small acts of care that become, over time, the only language love has left. Readers who appreciate historical fiction where the drama is domestic and the stakes are measured in promises kept and broken, where the land itself is a character, and where redemption arrives not in a single moment but across years of stubborn, unglamorous effort, will find much to consider in “Through Our Own Wrong Eyes.”

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