East of Eden

In the main plot, the sons of civil war veteran Cyrus Trask, Charles and Adam grow up to despise each other, Charles never leaving the farm but Adam having been sent the the Army by his father spends years wandering as a vagrant. Eventually the sons inherit great wealth from their father. The story expands to include Kathy a sociopath from a very young age, who, after murdering her parents in a staged arson/robbery, becomes a prostitute and attempts to usurp the business from her pimp. However the attempted usurpation fails and the pimp beats her almost to death. The very injured Kathy shows up at the Trask farm where Adam seemingly falls in love at first sight and takes on her recovery as a project. Shortly thereafter, having split the inheritance with his brother, Adam takes off to Salinas and along the way marries Kathy even though Kathy has no interest in marriage or indeed any normal relationship with a man. Soon after arrival in Salinas, after a failed abortion attempt, Kathy gives birth to two sons, Cal and Aron, then literally the next day, Kathy shoots Adam in the shoulder and flees to eventually become the owner of a whore house in the town of Salinas.

Cut to the end of the book when the boys are seventeen, Cal is smart and a respected loner, Aron is the pretty one that everybody likes. Also everybody (apparently) but Aron is aware that mom Kathy runs a brothel…

Adam asked, “Do you know where your brother is?”

“No, I don’t,” said Cal.

“Weren’t you with him at all?”

“No.”

“He hasn’t been home for two nights. Where is he?”

“How do I know?” said Cal. “Am I supposed to look after him?”

The crux of the novel is that Cal decides to make money for his father as a gift, at least, in part to compensate dad (dilettante, incompetent saint that he is) for losing half the family fortune trying to open an ice factory. He gets help from Tom Hamilton in order to invest in bean futures that Tom correctly suspects will rise a great deal in the run up to World War I. Of course Dad rejects the gift as evil war profiteering, so Cal takes Aron to see Mom (Kate the Madame) and horrified, fragile Aron joins the army eventually getting himself killed. Dad has another stroke which is almost but not quite fatal so that he is able to utter his final “Timshel”. (which I interpret as offering forgiveness to Cal in only two syllables instead of the four syllables required for "I forgive you. ")

This fulfils the place about half way through the book when trying to decide what to finally name his unnamed toddler sons, Adam, Samuel Hamilton and Adam’s chinese servant/savant Lee discuss deeply the biblical story of Cain and Abel, (Long story short, Cain killed Abel) and what was God’s judgement upon Cain. Lee does research and concludes that God’s judgement is that Cain “mayest” rule over sin. (and that this is the critical interpretation of the hebrew word “Timshel”).

In the subordinate plot, Samuel Hamilton in Salinas raises seven(?) children in near poverty but also in great joy and they achieve independence. There are lots of vignettes about the joys and tragedies of the family. We get lots of gorgeous prose about the Hamilton family and the overall idyllic environment of the Salinas Valley, alas, none of it really progresses the plot of the book.