A deeply realized, if overlong, novel of neurodivergence and golf.
In Anderson’s novel, a young golfer on the autism spectrum does time for murder.
Charles “Chunk” Dawson’s Asperger’s syndrome has always set him apart. People often patronize or belittle him—or even misinterpret his affect for arrogance or aloofness. Since his meteoric rise as a teenage golf phenom, he’s mostly been able to hide his condition. “I certainly didn’t want the truth to ever come out. I wanted them to fear, not pity me. I also wanted to retain the power of a secret, like the philanderer, or boozer, or embezzler who draws strength from the excitement of the initial impunity.” Even when he went on trial for killing a man, Chunk kept his Asperger’s hidden from the court, convinced he would be acquitted regardless. He was wrong, and he’s now serving a five-to-seven-year sentence at the Western Missouri Diagnostic and Correction Center. As Chunk bides his time until his release, he ruminates on how his life came to unfold the way it did: his adoption by a wealthy but dysfunctional couple in San Diego County; his aptitude for golf, fostered by his sage, arthritic trainer-turned-caddie, Jim Wellington; and the confrontation that led to the death of one of Chunk’s opponents. Is Chunk the greatest redemption story in sports waiting to happen, or is he about to reenter a world with which he is—and has always been—completely incompatible? Anderson’s prose is sharp and insightful, capturing Chunk’s elegant philosophizing: “I am a professional golfer but will readily admit that I am an amateur human being.” More than the plot, it’s Chunk and his understated yet gripping storytelling style that keep the reader invested. Even so, at nearly 500 pages, the book is far longer than it needs to be, and there are moments when the momentum lags. Fans of golf will especially enjoy this offbeat tale, but at its heart, Chunk’s story is one of alienation that should appeal to loners and malcontents of all stripes.
A deeply realized, if overlong, novel of neurodivergence and golf.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 485
Publisher: Manuscript
Review Posted Online: June 17, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An uncompromising message, delivered via a gripping story with two engaging heroines.
An undergraduate at Brown University unearths the buried history of a Latine artist.
As in her bestselling debut, Olga Dies Dreaming (2022), Gonzalez shrewdly anatomizes racial and class hierarchies. Her bifurcated novel begins at a posh art-world party in 1985 as the title character, a Cuban American land and body artist, garners recognition that threatens the ego of her older, more famous husband, white minimalist sculptor Jack Martin. The story then shifts to Raquel Toro, whose working-class, Puerto Rican background makes her feel out of place among the “Art History Girls” who easily chat with professors and vacation in Europe. Nonetheless, in the spring of 1998, Raquel wins a prestigious summer fellowship at the Rhode Island School of Design, and her faculty adviser is enthusiastic about her thesis on Jack Martin, even if she’s not. Soon she’s enjoying the attentions of Nick Fitzsimmons, a well-connected, upper-crust senior. As Raquel’s story progresses, Anita’s first-person narrative acquires a supernatural twist following the night she falls from the window of their apartment —“jumped? or, could it be, pushed?”—but it’s grimly realistic in its exploration of her toxic relationship with Jack. (A dedication, “In memory of Ana,” flags the notorious case of sculptor Carl Andre, tried and acquitted for the murder of his wife, artist Ana Mendieta.) Raquel’s affair with Nick mirrors that unequal dynamic when she adapts her schedule and appearance to his whims, neglecting her friends and her family in Brooklyn. Gonzalez, herself a Brown graduate, brilliantly captures the daily slights endured by someone perceived as Other, from microaggressions (Raquel’s adviser refers to her as “Mexican”) to brutally racist behavior by the Art History Girls. While a vividly rendered supporting cast urges Raquel to be true to herself and her roots, her research on Martin leads to Anita’s art and the realization that she belongs to a tradition that’s been erased from mainstream art history.
An uncompromising message, delivered via a gripping story with two engaging heroines.Pub Date: March 5, 2024
ISBN: 9781250786210
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Flatiron Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 18, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
A stunning feat of storytelling and moral clarity.
An Irishman uncovers abuse at a Magdalen laundry in this compact and gripping novel.
As Christmas approaches in the winter of 1985, Bill Furlong finds himself increasingly troubled by a sense of dissatisfaction. A coal and timber merchant living in New Ross, Ireland, he should be happy with his life: He is happily married and the father of five bright daughters, and he runs a successful business. But the scars of his childhood linger: His mother gave birth to him while still a teenager, and he never knew his father. Now, as he approaches middle age, Furlong wonders, “What was it all for?…Might things never change or develop into something else, or new?” But a series of troubling encounters at the local convent, which also functions as a “training school for girls” and laundry business, disrupts Furlong’s sedate life. Readers familiar with the history of Ireland’s Magdalen laundries, institutions in which women were incarcerated and often died, will immediately recognize the circumstances of the desperate women trapped in New Ross’ convent, but Furlong does not immediately understand what he has witnessed. Keegan, a prizewinning Irish short story writer, says a great deal in very few words to extraordinary effect in this short novel. Despite the brevity of the text, Furlong’s emotional state is fully rendered and deeply affecting. Keegan also carefully crafts a web of complicity around the convent’s activities that is believably mundane and all the more chilling for it. The Magdalen laundries, this novel implicitly argues, survived not only due to the cruelty of the people who ran them, but also because of the fear and selfishness of those who were willing to look aside because complicity was easier than resistance.
A stunning feat of storytelling and moral clarity.Pub Date: Nov. 30, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-8021-5874-1
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Grove
Review Posted Online: Aug. 31, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2021
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