The Book of Sorrows

The Book of Sorrows is the sequel novel to Walter Wangerin, Jr.'s The Book of the Dun Cow. Published by Zondervan in 1985, it was received quite well by publications such as the Washington Post, whose review called it "a beautifully written fantasy anchored starkly in reality." Readers noted it for its melancholy tone, with one of the main themes of the book being sorrow.

Plot summary

Russell the Fox

The Book of Sorrows begins almost exactly where the last book ended. The great war is over and Chauntecleer and his animals are all mending the damage that it left. Chauntecleer leads them on a journey to find a new resting place, while the climate slowly changes from summer to autumn. Early in their journey the animals are obligated to care for Russell, the fox, one of the main characters from the last novel, who suffered poisoning from biting into too many basilisks during the conflict. Russell's injury has caused his lips and nose to crack and ooze. It seems that it will never heal because the fox has trouble keeping quiet. Pertelote, Chauntecleer's wife, is reduced to drugging the fox with a narcotic in hopes that it will keep him from using his mouth long enough for it to heal.

Freitag, the mouse brother who is closest to Russell, tries continually to get him to stop talking, but the fox doesn't listen. He instead brings Freitag to a nearby stream where he emphatically tells him how to catch minnows with his tail until his lips and nose begin to crack and bubble. The fox eventually breaks down during his lesson to the mouse and cries out, "I only want to talk!" The animals hear him and come to calm him down. He is near death and his injuries have retrogressed. The fox seems to have lost his will to live, for he is no longer speaking. Chauntecleer begins to help Russell eat, by first placing the food in the fox's mouth, and mechanically grinds the fox's teeth with his own wings. But the poison has rotted the roots of Russell's teeth, which loosen during Chauntecleer's feedings. Chauntecleer then begins chewing the food with his own mouth, and spitting it into the fox's, but it soon becomes apparent to him that he is feeding a lifeless corpse.

The hemlock tree

Devastated by Russell's death, Chauntecleer and his company move farther away from the land where the war took place. Along the way they contact a beetle named Black Lazarus, a grave digger. Chauntecleer requests a special grave for the fox, one by the great ocean, Wyrmsmere, which requires that the beetle first line the grave with stone, lest the body be washed up. The animals have a service for their fallen comrade and then continue on, looking for a new resting place. Eventually they come to a pleasant hemlock tree rooted near a river. Here the animals make their new home.

In a canyon nearby, two coyotes are making a new home for their growing family. They find a crippled bird who can only say two things: “Jug Jug” and “Tereu.” What is unknown to the coyotes is that the bird is guarding a hole that is somewhere in the canyon- one that, when the bird descended, led her to the center of the earth where she found Wyrm who managed to trick her into drinking some of his putrid essence, causing her tongue to rot and crippling her form and speech.

At the hemlock tree it is discovered that Chauntecleer is on a downward spiral into a deep depression brought on by the loss of Russell and Mundo Cani. At one point the rooster walks down to the river, stands over it and sees his reflection. After a few moments he simply decides to let himself fall into it, and be swept away into the more violent currents. As he is drowning the rooster actually begins to think his end would be for the better, considering his horrible guilt. Just as he is about to die he is rescued; pulled ashore by the Dun Cow, who begins to clean him. Chauntecleer questions why she decided to save him, and feels that he cannot stand her cleaning him, for he is completely undeserving of compassion. The Dun Cow leaves him, and the rooster resolves to simply lie there, and sleep, for as long as he could stand.

The animals manage to get by without Chauntecleer's attention. Instead the rooster simply walks about in a fog of delirium and self-pity. Even when he is sleeping, he suffers, for in his dreams he hears horrible singing that taunts him in his sorrow. Chauntecleer only becomes more conscious when he comes upon the sight of Chalcedony, one of his hens, feasting on nothing but locust shells. The fatter hens have left her nothing in the way of seed or grass, and thus she is emaciated. The rooster seeks to console her. He promises to set things right, and to care for her until she is well, for he feels that this may be the only thing he can actually do to earn any sort of redemption; is to try to help others in the present. Unfortunately, though, the rooster is quickly pulled away from the animals again, for the remains of Russell the fox have re-animated due to the dark influence of Wyrm on his body.

From each, for each

Pertelote, upon hearing this report from Chauntecleer's general, John Wesley, rushes to the oceanside, where Russell's grave is. She gets there in time to see Chauntecleer, bruised and cut, committing the twice-killed body to the ocean Wyrmsmere. Pertelote comforts him by holding him and stroking her husband, but he admits that he cannot stand it, for the love of his subjects is more than he thinks he deserves. Ultimately Chauntecleer decides that he can at least do his best to restore some order to his people, and thus keep Chalcedony from starving.

The rooster returns with his wife to the hemlock tree where he instates upon his kind a new law. Chauntecleer intends for them now to live in socialism; each animal scouring as much food as they can, and then laying it down in food bins, where it will be distributed evenly among them all. This new form of order comes as a great revival to the animals, which causes their quality of life to improve, and their feeling of leadership returning. Soon, animals from all over begin to come to the hemlock tree, for the cold winter months have made them desperate and hungry, and they all seem willing to file themselves under this new law in exchange for enough to feed their families.

The forest comes alive with brotherhood and order, yet the rooster still holds on to a deeply seated depression. This becomes increasingly hard on his wife, as any affection is rejected by Chauntecleer in his guilt. The rooster's dreams also become worse, as the evil songs begin to sing of Russell and Mundo Cani. Chauntecleer begins to think that these dreams may actually be the product of Wyrm. In the background he can always hear a woman's wretched sobbing and two completely indistinguishable sounds. Chauntecleer spends his nights stalking around his territory, still shrouded in a mist of sorrow.

The coyote

Chauntecleer's redemption finally comes to him in the form of a coyote named Ferric, who has come to find food for his newborn children. Upon finding Chauntecleer's kingdom, he integrates himself and begins taking sufficient provisions for his family. Ferric does this a few more times before he and Chauntecleer actually communicate. He learns about the coyote's home, his children and wife, and the bird with no tongue. When he inquires the name of that bird, Ferric only knows to repeat the only things that the bird can say: “Jug Jug” and “Tereu.” These are the words that Chauntecleer hears in his nightmares, which lead him to believe that the bird would know how to travel into the earth.

Chauntecleer's mood improves. He begins crowing in triumph and rallying the animals together to his cause. He promises them all that he has the ability to go and rescue their savior, Mundo Cani, and thus bring back to their society the greatness of the times before the war.

At first, Pertelote is overwhelmed with excitement and enthusiasm over her husband's newfound passion for life, but that is soon replaced with dread when she comes to understand her husband's plan. Her fears that Chauntecleer's mission is nothing short of suicide are confirmed when he confides to her of his attempt to rescue Mundo Cani and defeat Wyrm and he knows that his chances of survival are slim. The next morning Pertelote sees him standing by the hemlock with a band of animals that have agreed to go with him to where the coyote lives. Chauntecleer mounts a black stag's antlers and rides off as the herd of animals set out on a journey to redeem their leader.

Wyrm

Eventually, the animals are led to the crippled bird by Ferric the coyote. Chauntecleer asks the bird to reveal the location of Wyrm. The bird complies by leading him behind two bushes where he finds the opening. Chauntecleer enters the darkness followed by his general, John Wesley. John Wesley traverses the cave to the bowels of the planet, where he finds the skeletal remains of Wyrm, covered in small glowing worm-like parasites that act as a light source. The weasel finds Chauntecleer sitting inside the Wyrm's skull, clutching a smaller skull in his wing. John asks if he has defeated Wyrm, to which Chauntecleer replies that Wyrm had been dead when he found him, and that his essence had been consumed by the parasites all around them. He then reveals that the skull he is holding is the head of Mundo Cani, who died after three days in the earth. Chauntecleer feels that he is robbed of his only chance to redeem himself, and therefore feels that he should simply lie in the earth until he expires. John Wesley refuses to give up on his master, however, and to coaxes him back to the surface. The Weasel eventually steals the precious skull from Chauntecleer's grasp and runs all the way to the entrance with it, taunting Chauntecleer to keep him following.

The two animals emerge from the hole in the earth; the weasel first, and then Chauntecleer. Chauntecleer attacks the weasel with his spur, cutting at John Wesley's haunch, which he just brushes off and continues running through the canyon. The rooster in all of his rage, leaps onto the black stag that had carried him there, and commands him to take after the weasel, reinforcing it with a sharp jab of his other spur, deep into the stag's side. The animal reacts to the pain by starting a stampede of all the confused animals that had come along with Chauntecleer. The weasel manages to stay ahead of them just long enough to reach the coyote's den where one of the young coyotes comes to John Wesley's rescue. The Weasel tries to warn the young coyote of the incoming danger, but not before his mother, Ferric's wife Rachel comes out to see him as well. In the end, the stampede of animals comes rushing after John Wesley, and though he manages to escape with his life, the coyotes are crushed under the stampeding herd. The animals scatter, and the rooster reclaims the skull from where John Wesley left it and begins his long walk home, leaving the two dead coyotes and a hidden general alone.

Meanwhile, the animals at the hemlock tree are facing an oncoming snowstorm, and with Chauntecleer away, the full force of leadership begins to bear down on Pertelote's head. The weather continues to grow harsher, and although Pertelote crushes any rebellion with the memory of Chauntecleer, the unity of the paradise begins to fade.

Eventually the rooster returns home in very poor shape, for the long stormy path that he's taken has left him dirty and cold. The animals are indifferent when they see him, as they were expecting to see the glorious party return with him alongside Mundo Cani yet find only a tattered rooster with a skull. Pertelote confronts Chauntecleer about his journey, and is solemn when she hears about Mundo Cani and Wyrm's death. Chauntecleer says that now the only thing left for him to do is give Mundo Cani a proper burial, and with that he leans in to embrace his wife, who is taken aback as one of the glowing string-like parasites comes climbing out of his nasal passages. Chauntecleer feels shunned by his wife and decides to rest in the hemlock tree.

By now the bird can hear the voices of the worms inside his head, even when he is not asleep. As he sits on a branch of the hemlock tree, they tell him that the animals are plotting a revolt for his unfulfilled promises. In fact, the wolves in the area are actually trying to turn the animals against their ruler, threatening to kill anyone who is loyal to him, but the paranoia that the parasites instill in Chauntecleer only makes the situation worse. It is when he is sitting in the tree that he begins to notice the scared accusing look in all the animals faces, and combined with the voices’ subliminal suggestions, their staring causes him to leap up in a bit of rage and crow,

“What have I ever done to you?”

After this outburst the animals begin to disperse to unknown fates, and soon, all but the original hens have left. In a bout of insanity the rooster leaves the hemlock and goes with the skull of Mundo Cani to bury it. Pertelote goes after him, following him all the way to the ruins of the fortress that was built during the summer's war, knowing that the wolves would surely find him there and kill him. She tries to confess her love to him, and explain her revulsion earlier, but he disregards it all, saying that she must have been a liar from the beginning who never loved him.

Eventually the wolves arrive to kill Chauntecleer, but he manages to defeat them in a glorious battle, using only his wits and war-spurs. He is left quite ravaged by the fight, though, both mentally and physically. The rooster can see that all of the animals that had forsaken him before have returned to see his great battle- even Ferric, whose wife and children were killed by Chauntecleer's actions. The rooster's pain climaxes when he discovers that Ferric is so quick to forgive him, and begins to lick him where he has been wounded. Chauntecleer cannot stand to accept the love of the Coyote and recoils from him. In the end, Chauntecleer is in so much pain from the suffering he has caused, confusion he feels over his people and his wife, and sick influence of the parasites inside of him, that he can only resolve to take his war-spur and cut himself open, and let all of the evil worms within him drain out with his blood.

Pertelote comes over to him and holds him gently, singing to him, and trying to comfort him in his last moments of life. Chauntecleer appears to have some sort of relief in death, and the last thing he says before passing on is that he could not manage to bury the skull of Mundo Cani, because his nose was far too big to fit in any of the holes he dug.