This high-concept novel has a bizarre, unique twist, but it’s not always easy to see through the dense prose.
In Goettel’s debut novel, a man becomes trapped in his wife’s body.
Young Linda has led a peculiar, sheltered life. Even before she and her husband drink poisoned wine that changes their lives, things aren’t exactly going well for her. She’s bulimic, dislikes her job at a group home, distrusts her husband and seems to be out of time and place, uncomfortable in her own skin. Perhaps that’s why she seems to disappear after drinking the funny wine. The drink kills her husband, but not entirely—though Derrick’s body is dead, he appears to have spiritually taken up residence inside of Linda. This isn’t the classic Freaky Friday type of body swap, since the Derrick who resides inside of Linda seems to maintain some of her ideas and personality, which may be why he has such an impossible time convincing Linda’s mother, Shelley, that he is really Derrick. Shelley, whose passive-aggressive nature has probably contributed to her daughter’s psychological issues, takes Linda/Derrick back to Linda’s childhood home while Linda recovers from the scare that sent her to the hospital and left Derrick dead. The two personalities struggle against one another inside Linda’s body as Linda fights to come back into herself, growing stronger and perhaps more stable through the strange ordeal. The novel, told from an omniscient perspective, employs a stream-of-consciousness style that, much like the personalities inside Linda, can be confusing. In one exchange at the hospital, the point of view shifts from the doctor to Linda/Derrick to Shelley in the space of just a few paragraphs. At other times, the rambling style of thought and speech makes little sense: “New England gentry, old English terms: saw-spins.” Elsewhere, Derrick’s ineptitude can be a bit much at times. It’s hard to believe he has no idea how to do laundry and has never heard of tortellini.
This high-concept novel has a bizarre, unique twist, but it’s not always easy to see through the dense prose.Pub Date: Feb. 20, 2013
ISBN: 978-1560027911
Page Count: 328
Publisher: University Editions
Review Posted Online: May 10, 2013
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.
Life lessons.
Angie Malone, the youngest of a big, warm Italian-American family, returns to her Pacific Northwest hometown to wrestle with various midlife disappointments: her divorce, Papa’s death, a downturn in business at the family restaurant, and, above all, her childlessness. After several miscarriages, she, a successful ad exec, and husband Conlan, a reporter, befriended a pregnant young girl and planned to adopt her baby—and then the birth mother changed her mind. Angie and Conlan drifted apart and soon found they just didn’t love each other anymore. Metaphorically speaking, “her need for a child had been a high tide, an overwhelming force that drowned them. A year ago, she could have kicked to the surface but not now.” Sadder but wiser, Angie goes to work in the struggling family restaurant, bickering with Mama over updating the menu and replacing the ancient waitress. Soon, Angie befriends another young girl, Lauren Ribido, who’s eager to learn and desperately needs a job. Lauren’s family lives on the wrong side of the tracks, and her mother is a promiscuous alcoholic, but Angie knows nothing of this sad story and welcomes Lauren into the DeSaria family circle. The girl listens in, wide-eyed, as the sisters argue and make wisecracks and—gee-whiz—are actually nice to each other. Nothing at all like her relationship with her sluttish mother, who throws Lauren out when boyfriend David, en route to Stanford, gets her pregnant. Will Lauren, who’s just been accepted to USC, let Angie adopt her baby? Well, a bit of a twist at the end keeps things from becoming too predictable.
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.Pub Date: July 1, 2004
ISBN: 0-345-46750-7
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2004
Less bleak than the subject matter might warrant—Hannah’s default outlook is sunny—but still, a wrenching depiction of war’s...
The traumatic homecoming of a wounded warrior.
The daughter of alcoholics who left her orphaned at 17, Jolene “Jo” Zarkades found her first stable family in the military: She’s served over two decades, first in the army, later with the National Guard. A helicopter pilot stationed near Seattle, Jo copes as competently at home, raising two daughters, Betsy and Lulu, while trying to dismiss her husband Michael’s increasing emotional distance. Jo’s mettle is sorely tested when Michael informs her flatly that he no longer loves her. Four-year-old Lulu clamors for attention while preteen Betsy, mean-girl-in-training, dismisses as dweeby her former best friend, Seth, son of Jo’s confidante and fellow pilot, Tami. Amid these challenges comes the ultimate one: Jo and Tami are deployed to Iraq. Michael, with the help of his mother, has to take over the household duties, and he rapidly learns that parenting is much harder than his wife made it look. As Michael prepares to defend a PTSD-afflicted veteran charged with Murder I for killing his wife during a dissociative blackout, he begins to understand what Jolene is facing and to revisit his true feelings for her. When her helicopter is shot down under insurgent fire, Jo rescues Tami from the wreck, but a young crewman is killed. Tami remains in a coma and Jo, whose leg has been amputated, returns home to a difficult rehabilitation on several fronts. Her nightmares in which she relives the crash and other horrors she witnessed, and her pain, have turned Jo into a person her daughters now fear (which in the case of bratty Betsy may not be such a bad thing). Jo can't forgive Michael for his rash words. Worse, she is beginning to remind Michael more and more of his homicide client. Characterization can be cursory: Michael’s earlier callousness, left largely unexplained, undercuts the pathos of his later change of heart.
Less bleak than the subject matter might warrant—Hannah’s default outlook is sunny—but still, a wrenching depiction of war’s aftermath.Pub Date: Jan. 31, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-312-57720-9
Page Count: 400
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Dec. 18, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2012
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