Let me introduce you to two debut novels about young men forced out of their retreat from life by a determined young woman. Both feel responsible for the deaths of a younger sister, both have absent fathers and serious mental health issues induced by trauma. Both are about to get a rude awakening. But, as you’ll see, the authors have dealt with these bare bones in very different ways.
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Epiphany Jones by Michael Grothaus
With no friends, a tedious job in a back room of a Chicago museum and an addiction to fake celebrity porn, Jerry doesn’t seem to have a heroic bone in his body. Since the death of his younger sister over a decade before, visual hallucinations, or figments as his psychiatrists calls them, have stood in for real relationships. More recently he’s been plagued by recurring dreams. When his colleague is murdered as a priceless van Gogh is stolen from the museum and the finger of suspicion points to him, his life becomes entangled with that of a woman even crazier than he is. Beautiful and troubled, Epiphany Jones believes she hears the voice of God and God’s got big plans for the pair of them.
I give up on this novel twice: the first time because I didn’t think a novel beginning with a man masturbating to an image of an Audrey Hepburn lookalike was for me; the second time, further in, because, gripped as I was, I was finding it too disturbing. But the blandness of the novel I’d picked up as respite (not the other one reviewed here) soon had me heading back to Epiphany Jones begging for more.
Addressing themes of mental health, sex trafficking and the emptiness of Hollywood, this is a page turning thriller with genuine psychological and sociopolitical depth and a wide emotional range through humour, pathos, shock and horror. While one can never be sure how closely fiction mirrors real life, the author, with a degree in filmmaking and years spent researching sex trafficking, has the right credentials to tackle these complex and disturbing subjects. Published a year ago now, and reminiscent of the Pulitzer prize winning The Orphan Master’s Son, I can only wish I’d read it earlier.
If the plot seems to creak ever so slightly in places, it’s just the sound of another piece of the jigsaw being transferred to a more intriguing place. In the end, everything fits: character, back story, setting and incidentals building an outstanding debut novel. Thanks to Orenda books for my review copy.
I give up on this novel twice: the first time because I didn’t think a novel beginning with a man masturbating to an image of an Audrey Hepburn lookalike was for me; the second time, further in, because, gripped as I was, I was finding it too disturbing. But the blandness of the novel I’d picked up as respite (not the other one reviewed here) soon had me heading back to Epiphany Jones begging for more.
Addressing themes of mental health, sex trafficking and the emptiness of Hollywood, this is a page turning thriller with genuine psychological and sociopolitical depth and a wide emotional range through humour, pathos, shock and horror. While one can never be sure how closely fiction mirrors real life, the author, with a degree in filmmaking and years spent researching sex trafficking, has the right credentials to tackle these complex and disturbing subjects. Published a year ago now, and reminiscent of the Pulitzer prize winning The Orphan Master’s Son, I can only wish I’d read it earlier.
If the plot seems to creak ever so slightly in places, it’s just the sound of another piece of the jigsaw being transferred to a more intriguing place. In the end, everything fits: character, back story, setting and incidentals building an outstanding debut novel. Thanks to Orenda books for my review copy.
Me, Myself and Them by Dan Mooney
Denis Murphy has everything under control, from the one hundred and twenty minutes he’s prepared to spend with his two friends in a cafe to his carefully ironed socks. And he really doesn’t mind the mess made by his eccentric housemates, their antics merely providing an excuse for some intensive cleaning. Otherwise, apart from a barely tolerated visit from his mother on a Sunday, Denis doesn’t do people. Fortunately, as a data analyst, he’s able to work from home.
Everything’s hunky-dory until his former girlfriend, Rebecca, arrives back in town. Before he knows it, she’s got him going out to restaurants, tolerating touching and even having a dance. His housemates warn him nothing good will come of it, but at least they have the grace to hide away when she moves in. Yet, as Denis becomes more human, they pile on the pressure, determined to drive her away.
Like the figurines in The Zoo by Jamie Mollart, Denis’ monstrous housemates are, of course, projections of his own mind. They help distance him from thoughts and feelings that might otherwise overwhelm him given his sense of responsibility for the tragedy that’s befallen his sister and another friend. What others might term obsessive-compulsive disorder, Denis considers an alternative lifestyle, freely chosen, not acknowledging what he’s lost in maintaining an illusory control.
Dan Mooney’s debut is published by Legend Press, who provided my proof copy. While neither the style nor the story got me particularly excited, it’s great to see men’s mental health addressed in accessible fiction, and others without much background knowledge might warm to it more.
Everything’s hunky-dory until his former girlfriend, Rebecca, arrives back in town. Before he knows it, she’s got him going out to restaurants, tolerating touching and even having a dance. His housemates warn him nothing good will come of it, but at least they have the grace to hide away when she moves in. Yet, as Denis becomes more human, they pile on the pressure, determined to drive her away.
Like the figurines in The Zoo by Jamie Mollart, Denis’ monstrous housemates are, of course, projections of his own mind. They help distance him from thoughts and feelings that might otherwise overwhelm him given his sense of responsibility for the tragedy that’s befallen his sister and another friend. What others might term obsessive-compulsive disorder, Denis considers an alternative lifestyle, freely chosen, not acknowledging what he’s lost in maintaining an illusory control.
Dan Mooney’s debut is published by Legend Press, who provided my proof copy. While neither the style nor the story got me particularly excited, it’s great to see men’s mental health addressed in accessible fiction, and others without much background knowledge might warm to it more.
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