Book Review: Welding with Children

By Jhareese Walker

​Tim Gautreaux is a novelist and short story writer who was born in 1947 in Morgan City, Louisiana. Some of his published books are: The Missing, The Clearing, and Welding with Children. In an interview with Dayne Sherman, An American journalist, Gautreaux said, “I just learned along the way that writing comes from living. Living doesn’t come from writing. The best way to learn how to write about children is to have a couple of your own” (Sherman). Gautreaux exemplifies this mindset in his book Welding with Children published by Picador in 1999. Welding with Children is a collection of eleven short stories that have a common theme of portraying the lifestyle of a southern working-class families.

There were a few stories that really intrigued me, but there was one story in particular that stood out to me more than the others. The short story “Welding with Children” is a great story simply due to the self-realization the main character experiences throughout the story. Bruton, the grandfather in the story, serves as his own life lesson. By watching the four children of his own children, he finds himself in need of some self-improvement once he notices that the actions of the children are the product of their parents’ standards. By the end of the story, Bruton attempts to turn the children to God: “’Does your mamma ever talk to y’all about, you know, God?’ ‘My mamma says God when she’s cussing Melvin,’ Tamynette said.” (Gautreaux 8). While not having done the greatest job of raising his own children, he wants to do better by his grandchildren. A few things that I like about the text was the southern dialect that Gautreaux included within the story. He seems to include a little of himself and his heritage throughout the whole text. Also, in another short story called “Easy Pickings”, Gautreaux writes about an old lady who gets robbed by a man that goes by the name of Big Blade:

Big Blade growled, giving the old woman a push toward her screen door. ‘I want your money’…’Well, I be damn. Ain’t you got nobody better to rob than an ol’ lady whose husband died twenty-nine years ago of a heart attack in a bourrée game holding ace, king, queen of trumps?’” (Gautreaux 63).

Many of the stories in his collection are unique scenarios which make each story fun to read. Many people might enjoy this text because each story can be fun to read even for the students that don’t usually like reading. Each storyline in the collection is unique which instantly can draw the reader to the story. Not only can it be fun to read, but there are life lessons that can be taken from each of these stories. Being able to read a text that is fun, yet possesses the capabilities to be informative, is special and is not something that every book can do.

---