Skip to main content

Review--Maynard and Jennica, Rudolph Delson


Maynard and Jennica is the story of Maynard Gogarty, a man in his late thirties who makes documentaries, and Jennica Green, a twenty-something woman from California who says "like" a lot. They meet by chance one swelteringly hot August morning on a New York City suway train, and later enter into a relationship. The story has multiple narrators, including dead people, animals, and inanimate objects. It isn't difficult to tell which voice is which, though, which makes for a highly enjoyable read.

The first part of the book takes place during the summer of 2000 and the winter of 2001. The second half of the book takes a completely different turn when the treagedy of 9/11 occurs, and while it has a major effect on the rest of the United States, it has a subtle effect on Maynard and Jennica's relationship. It's fun because my neighborhood is mentioned in the novel. And Delson doesn't drag down the plot in the second half of the book with too much wistful thinking or "big thoughts" about 9/11.

In short, although the plot seems to drag in places and the coincidences are a little too, well, coincidental, Maynard and Jennica is a quirky, creative, not to mention funny, novel about relationships in modern-day New York City.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Another giveaway

This time, the publicist at WW Norton sent me two copies of The Glass of Time , by Michael Cox--so I'm giving away the second copy. Cox is the author of The Meaning of Night, and this book is the follow-up to that. Leave a comment here to enter to win it! The deadline is next Sunday, 10/5/08.

A giveaway winner, and another giveaway

The winner of the Girl in a Blue Dress contest is... Anna, of Diary of An Eccentric ! My new contest is for a copy of The Shape of Mercy , by Susan Meissner. According to Publisher's Weekly : Meissner's newest novel is potentially life-changing, the kind of inspirational fiction that prompts readers to call up old friends, lost loves or fallen-away family members to tell them that all is forgiven and that life is too short for holding grudges. Achingly romantic, the novel features the legacy of Mercy Hayworth—a young woman convicted during the Salem witch trials—whose words reach out from the past to forever transform the lives of two present-day women. These book lovers—Abigail Boyles, elderly, bitter and frail, and Lauren Lars Durough, wealthy, earnest and young—become unlikely friends, drawn together over the untimely death of Mercy, whose precious diary is all that remains of her too short life. And what a diary! Mercy's words not only beguile but help Abigail and Lars

Six Degrees of Barbara Pym's Novels

This year seems to be The Year of Barbara Pym; I know some of you out there are involved in some kind of a readalong in honor of the 100th year of her birth. I’ve read most of her canon, with only The Sweet Dove Died, Civil to Strangers, An Academic Question, and Crampton Hodnet left to go (sadly). Barbara Pym’s novels feature very similar casts of characters: spinsters, clergymen, retirees, clerks, and anthropologists, with which she had direct experience. So it stands to reason that there would be overlaps in characters between the novels. You can trace that though the publication history of her books and therefore see how Pym onionizes her stories and characters. She adds layers onto layers, adding more details as her books progress. Some Tame Gazelle (1950): Archdeacon Hoccleve makes his first appearance. Excellent Women (1952): Archdeacon Hoccleve gives a sermon that is almost incomprehensible to Mildred Lathbury; Everard Bone understands it, however, and laughs