What am I celebrating this week?
It's the weekend!
The website for young adult author Kate Larkindale. A place for her musings on writing, publishing and a day job in the film business.
I picked this up on my last trip to the library because I've enjoyed other books by Matthew Quick and figured I'd probably like this one too. And while I didn't love it, I did enjoy it and appreciate what it was trying to do.
Lucas Goodgame has survived an unspeakable tragedy that has taken his wife from him and torn his entire small town apart. He manages to hold himself together with his belief that his wife, Darcey, has stayed with him in her angelic form, visiting each night to hold him and guide him through his grief and the fact his analyst appears to have abandoned him.
Through a series of letters to his analyst, Lucas tells the story of his grief and eventual healing, something that is brought about when a young man, the brother of the person who instigated the violence that tore through the town, sets up camp in his yard. A former counsellor at the high school, Lucas is drawn to help this damaged boy, and through helping him, somehow manages to heal the entire town.
Lucas is a fascinating POV character in that he wholly believes what he thinks is happening, even though his interactions with the townspeople show us that he is not seeing everything as clearly as he thinks he is. And what a town it is! All the citizens who rally around Lucas have their own quirks and eccentricities and they are really what makes this book so delightful.
The eventual revealing of the truth of what happened the night of the tragedy, and Lucas's own acceptance of the truth make for compelling reading. And of course, the fact that there is a movie theatre right there in the centre of the story, doesn't hurt. At least from my perspective.
So I'd recommend this one. It is heavy in places, and its depiction of grief and grieving is very real and raw, so if you're in a fragile place or on your own journey through grief, it may be tough read. You've been warned...
But don't just listen to me. Here's the blurb:
Lucas Goodgame lives in Majestic, Pennsylvania, a quaint suburb that has been torn apart by a recent tragedy. Everyone in Majestic sees Lucas as a hero—everyone, that is, except Lucas himself. Insisting that his deceased wife, Darcy, visits him every night in the form of an angel, Lucas spends his time writing letters to his former Jungian analyst, Karl. It is only when Eli, an eighteen-year-old young man whom the community has ostracized, begins camping out in Lucas’s backyard that an unlikely alliance takes shape and the two embark on a journey to heal their neighbors and, most important, themselves.I managed to get quite a bit of writing done over the weekend and I'm quite happy with the scenes I wrote. I feel like I may have sorted a few things out in my head about who knows what and that has clarified the way forward for me.
Means I need to go back and change some stuff further back, but I'll do that later. I know editing is going to take a long time; it always does. One of the negatives to writing without much in the way of an outline or plan...
So my goal for this week is to try and write at least one more chapter. It may not happen - I'm working the next two weekends because our next event is happening over that period. Plus, the Film Festival starts at the end of July. I haven't bought a ton of tickets for the Film Festival this year, but I got a ten-trip ticket for Christmas that I've redeemed, so I'm going to at least ten.
What are your goals this week?
A friend at work gave me this to read because she thought I'd enjoy it. She was right...
It's kind of an epic story in that it spans around 70 years in life of Cyril from his birth out of wedlock in 1940s Ireland to the present day. In telling the story of this one man, we get to see the way attitudes and ideas have changed over the years. And the ways they have not.
Cyril realises quite young that he's gay, even if he isn't able to communicate what it is he feels when the glamourous young Julian shows up at his house and wants to compare willies. Cyril's attraction to Julian forms the backbone of his identity, even while Julian seems oblivious to his desires.
With Julian unable (or unwilling) to return his affections, Cyril is forced to seek satisfaction in the only places available to him in the repressed Ireland of the 1950s and 1960s. It's only after escaping Ireland for Amsterdam that Cyril is finally able to accept himself and the love of another man.
In 1980s New York, that acceptance is turning to fear with the AIDS epidemic ravaging the gay community, yet it isn't AIDS that shatters Cyril's life but a random act of violence. Broken, he returns to Ireland to try and reconnect with his past and find a way forward. And in doing so, he may just find the family he's never had before...
I really enjoyed this book. Cyril was a fascinating character because he is terribly flawed, yet still very relatable. It was also fascinating to follow the ways attitudes toward homosexuality changed over the period of time, particularly in Ireland with its deep rooted Catholicism.
The author's note at the end was also a fascinating read, so if you decide to read this book, don't skip that!
But don't just listen to me. Here's the blurb:
Cyril Avery is not a real Avery or at least that’s what his adoptive parents tell him. And he never will be. But if he isn’t a real Avery, then who is he?I got another chapter written over the weekend, so this week my goal is to add another one (if I don't take those days off) or another four or five if I do. I feel like a lot of what's happening in this story is happening in the wrong order, but I'll deal with that in editing, once I've seen the shape of the whole book. The good thing about writing in Scrivener is that it's easy to move scenes around.
I got a few more query rejections last week too, so I'm going to try and send out a few more queries this week too. Some of the agents I wanted to query in my first round were closed, so hopefully they will have re-opened now.
And that's about it for goals. What are your goals this week?