BIGFOOT DREAMS

by Francine Prose ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 23, 1986

In a charming departure from her earlier mystical explorations of the past (Hungry Hearts, Household Saints), Prose here takes on the quirky routines and sweet, soaring aspirations of contemporary family life; and the result is funny, imaginative and heartwarming. Vera Perl, a sprightly New York City single mother, is in danger of losing her job writing fabricated copy for a smarmy supermarket tabloid, This Week. The reason: A story she has Written (""Fountain of Youth Flows in Brooklyn"") appears, against all odds, to be true, and the paper is being sued. Vera's bosses believe that Vera may have ESP; but what Vera really has is a remarkable empathy with the unarticulated yearnings of those who devour This Week's promises of miracle diets and sightings of Bigfoot alive and untamed in the wild--in other words, with people who long for a better, more youthful, more magical world. So--when Vera's own dream of a better world (being reunited with her dashing, perpetually adolescent husband Lowell and living happily with him and their daughter, Rosie) comes unhinged, Vera travels west to discover once and for all whether Bigfoot does exists. What she discovers is a different kind of miracle: a model of a peaceful, vital middle-age on the very edge of her own psychic continent. The surface of Bigfoot Dreams glitters: with wit, movement, bright coins of characters--and, unfortunately, sometimes with a little tinsel in the form of overextended This Week headlines and motifs. Still, all in all, a rich, funny and satisfying novel.

Pub Date: April 23, 1986

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Pantheon

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 1986

Categories: FICTION