A flawed but fascinating examination of love, trust, faith, and self-perception.
Price offers a debut novel about the calamitous life of a 35-year-old American man studying to become a deacon in the Catholic Church.
Gilmore Funnel is a “reluctant Christian” and regards himself as being exceptionally unlucky, with a “long list of…mental problems.” His friend, a missionary, was killed in a far-off land, his marriage has failed, and he’s prone to scalding himself while drinking coffee. Despite his wavering faith in God, he drifts toward becoming a deacon, after which he’ll no longer be allowed to marry and must abstain from sex. Enter Lisa, a strange and beguiling 19-year-old girl who works with him at a preschool. After Gilmore nervously invites her for coffee, they form an unusual bond of mutual trust, and Lisa confides to Gilmore that she’s unable to have an orgasm. Gilmore seeks to remedy this by gifting her a copy of the book You and Your Orgasm, and they soon begin to work through the sexual exercises together. Lisa tells Gilmore not to fall in love with her, which is wise given the fact that she has an angry, protective father and an even angrier boyfriend. But Gilmore’s predicament becomes even more precarious when Monsignor Freeman suggests that he become a priest. This novel has a bright, original, and engaging storyline that’s both amusing and bewildering. The author offers refreshing turns of phrase and a delightful eye for detail, as when he describes a pharmacist who “blinked several times from behind her contact lens, the outline of which, was as delicate as a fissure in a gemstone.” However, when uncontrolled, the prose can become prolix and tedious: “A miasma of carbons churns in the air causing a magnification of the Burger King which sets on property formerly owned by the seminary and which was sold to finance a new chair in hermeneutics.” Typos also appear throughout: “One has only to Imagine a shimmering tarmac In an equatorial country.” Yet, despite the novel’s need for a more thorough copy edit, it does show a curiously captivating imagination at work—and a promising literary talent.
A flawed but fascinating examination of love, trust, faith, and self-perception.Pub Date: Aug. 29, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-974061-53-2
Page Count: 178
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Sept. 13, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Entertaining and thoroughly engrossing.
Another reboot of Jane Austen?!? Hadlow pulls it off in a smart, heartfelt novel devoted to bookish Mary, middle of the five sisters in Pride and Prejudice.
Part 1 recaps Pride and Prejudice through Mary’s eyes, climaxing with the humiliating moment when she sings poorly at a party and older sister Elizabeth goads their father to cut her off in front of everyone. The sisters’ friend Charlotte, who marries the unctuous Mr. Collins after Elizabeth rejects him, emerges as a pivotal character; her conversations with Mary are even tougher-minded here than those with Elizabeth depicted by Austen. In Part 2, two years later, Mary observes on a visit that Charlotte is deferential but remote with her husband; she forms an intellectual friendship with the neglected and surprisingly nice Mr. Collins that leads to Charlotte’s asking Mary to leave. In Part 3, Mary finds refuge in London with her kindly aunt and uncle, Mr. and Mrs. Gardiner. Mrs. Gardiner is the second motherly woman, after Longbourn housekeeper Mrs. Hill, to try to undo the psychic damage wrought by Mary’s actual mother, shallow, status-obsessed Mrs. Bennet, by building up her confidence and buying her some nice clothes (funded by guilt-ridden Lizzy). Sure enough, two suitors appear: Tom Hayward, a poetry-loving lawyer who relishes Mary’s intellect but urges her to also express her feelings; and William Ryder, charming but feckless inheritor of a large fortune, whom naturally Mrs. Bennet loudly favors. It takes some maneuvering to orchestrate the estrangement of Mary and Tom, so clearly right for each other, but debut novelist Hadlow manages it with aplomb in a bravura passage describing a walking tour of the Lake District rife with seething complications furthered by odious Caroline Bingley. Her comeuppance at Mary’s hands marks the welcome final step in our heroine’s transformation from a self-doubting wallflower to a vibrant, self-assured woman who deserves her happy ending. Hadlow traces that progression with sensitivity, emotional clarity, and a quiet edge of social criticism Austen would have relished.
Entertaining and thoroughly engrossing.Pub Date: March 31, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-12941-3
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: Dec. 22, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Anyone who believes in true love or is simply willing to accept it as the premise of a winding tale will find this debut an...
True love flares between two people, but they find that circumstances always impede it.
On a winter day in London, Laurie spots Jack from her bus home and he sparks a feeling in her so deep that she spends the next year searching for him. Her roommate and best friend, Sarah, is the perfect wing-woman but ultimately—and unknowingly—ends the search by finding Jack and falling for him herself. Laurie’s hasty decision not to tell Sarah is the second painful missed opportunity (after not getting off the bus), but Sarah’s happiness is so important to Laurie that she dedicates ample energy into retraining her heart not to love Jack. Laurie is misguided, but her effort and loyalty spring from a true heart, and she considers her project mostly successful. Perhaps she would have total success, but the fact of the matter is that Jack feels the same deep connection to Laurie. His reasons for not acting on them are less admirable: He likes Sarah and she’s the total package; why would he give that up just because every time he and Laurie have enough time together (and just enough alcohol) they nearly fall into each other’s arms? Laurie finally begins to move on, creating a mostly satisfying life for herself, whereas Jack’s inability to be genuine tortures him and turns him into an ever bigger jerk. Patriarchy—it hurts men, too! There’s no question where the book is going, but the pacing is just right, the tone warm, and the characters sympathetic, even when making dumb decisions.
Anyone who believes in true love or is simply willing to accept it as the premise of a winding tale will find this debut an emotional, satisfying read.Pub Date: Oct. 16, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-525-57468-2
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: July 30, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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