Krishna
From the title you would expect this to be a romantic story. You could not be more wrong. It aims to be a drama but after reading it, I do not know what exactly the author is aiming for. Whatever it is, she did not fully achieve it. It has its moments and like many other books, starts a bit strong but then just falls apart. Story first.
Two mutes in the town. An obese and dreamy Greek and a tall, intelligent looking one. The Greek, Spyros Antonapoulos, worked in his cousin’s fruit store. John Singer was his thin friend. He worked in a jewellery store across the street. When Spyros falls ill and recovers, he seems to resent Singer’s ways. Also wants to wander out more. When they finally realize that he has gone completely mad, they have to put the Greek away in an asylum and it breaks Singer.
Now Biff Brannon runs a pub and likes freaks. His wife Alice and he do not have a good relationship. He notices Stinger in the pub, drinking alone.
Meanwhile an obnoxious drunk is making a scene in the bar and when he is captured outside and brought back, Singer agrees to take him to his, Singer’s, home as he now lives alone.
He sobers up and realizes what a great help Singer has been. He finds himself a job. Mick is a girl who looks after her two younger sisters but is enthralled by classical music – Beethoven and Mozart.
You see that drunk sobered up and took a job but when you get to know him he yearns for Communism to take over America and preaches socialism to anyone who will listen – passionately and very angry when no one else understands.
Biff’s wife dies, and Biff feels bereft even though they quarreled all their married life. Meanwhile, Mick’s brother shoots a neighbour’s pretty girl called Baby and hides in a tree-house. The whole story turns grave in a second, which is astonishing.
Mick’s brother George, known as Bubber runs away and is caught. Baby’s parents demand payment for all of Baby’s treatment and recovery and do not want to have Bubber arrested.
Meanwhile the doctor, a disciple of Karl Marx and a fighter for emancipation of the black people in the US, oblivious to the irony of Communism not recognizing race or creed, has two sons and a daughter, all estranged as his wife left him, struggles to keep the relationships with his children. He also befriends Singer, ‘as the only white man who understands the struggles of his people’.
Singer pines for Antanapoulos and goes and meets him in the asylum where he resides. We find Antanapoulos blissfully ignorant of how much Singer likes him. Now Biff has a ‘fatherly’ crush on Mick and Mick herself has a ‘daughterly’ crush on Singer who is unaware of all this.
Copeland loses it when his daughter Portia comes drunk and reports to him that Portia’s son Willie, who was jailed for disturbing the peace was unruly and was put in solitary and tortured by leaving him tied up in a cold room for hours. His legs. which had open sores, gangrened and both had to be amputated to save his life. He goes to see the judge and gets arrested and attacks the police in the station and is thrown in a jail cell.
When he is freed and also when Willie is back minus his legs, Singer and Jack go to visit them and Jack gets into an ideological argument with Dr Copeland about whether all mankind should be freed from the slavery of capitalism or just the black people from the hidden slavery that still exists in America. Pretty tame stuff.
The story tries to be poignant but to me none of the characters were expressing their real feelings or emotions and they all seemed to be playing a partly stereotyped roles. Could not get into the story or feel what they felt. Consequently the book did not make the impact it could have, given the cast of characters and the setting provided.
Mick grows an obsession with Singer – we are not told whether she has a romantic crush on him or simply an obsession like a father figure, but hinting vaguely at the former – and follows him around without him being aware.
Towards the end, in response to a suddenly shocking news, one of the characters dies – committing suicide and the rest of the book (just a few end pages) analyzes how each one of the other characters who had grown close to the dead person deals with it. This is about the only piece in the story where you kind of briefly sit up and take notice but it does not go anywhere further after that.
There are tons of loose ends. That in itself is not an issue since this aims at a realistic story but none of the deep impressions someone made on another character seems to drag you along. Is it all about the futility of life? Is it all about nothing in particular?
The story does not even stay in your mind after you close the book.
3/10
– – Krishna (June 2019)