CROSSING GRAY STREET

A grieving widow goes on a serious of otherworldly adventures in Croop’s debut novel.

Adalyn believes she’s finally found love with a man named Matthew when the Covid-19 pandemic strikes; after a brief illness, Matthew dies. Shortly afterward, Adalyn sits on a neighborhood park bench and complains to the Creator she’s always worshipped: “God, I love you, but how could you do this to me?” she asks. “How could you when you know I’ve suffered enough?” And surprisingly, she gets an answer: “God has His reasons.” The speaker is Lenny, an angel and former ghost whom Adalyn already knows. Through their conversations, Croop ably fleshes out an elaborate fantasy cosmology, loosely based on aspects of Christianity. Lenny recently broke up with Matthew’s guardian angel, Melanie, who’s applied to Heaven’s Rebirth Application Offices to be reborn as a mortal; he saw Adalyn grieving from heaven’s watchtower and decided to offer her comfort. He takes her by the hand and brings her to the “ghost train,” complete with a conductor, which will take her to heaven; there, she’s issued an one-day pass to look for Matthew and spend a bit more time with him. In the process, she gets involved with her guardian angel, Maurice, and his real-world adventures back on Earth. Over the course of this novel, Croop relates Adalyn’s adventures and inner thoughts with a good deal of warmth and approachability. The characters are thinly conceived but uniformly fun, and the plotline involving Maurice and the thugs who threaten his legacy makes for engaging reading. Along the way, the author sometimes turns religious concepts like heaven and angels into fodder for humor: “It was common knowledge that the ringing of a bell meant an angel got its wings….it was possible to simply buy wings in heaven. I suppose it all made sense since the cash register bell rang after every purchase.”

A whimsical and ultimately touching story of love and the afterlife.