Dust-up with an Author

When you write book reviews—even occasionally—you imagine a pacific activity.   But the waters of reflection can be rippled if you have the temerity to be honest.  This past summer I came across a novel put out by a small press, Baxter's Friends by Ned Randle.  The publisher’s description piqued my interest.   

Jerry Baxter’s father liked to sing the old cowboy song, “O bury me not on the lone prairie …” when he drank. Ironically, Baxter and his two good friends, Hugh Ferguson and Al Mitchell, are soon to be buried alive, and the hole they are digging for themselves is getting deeper all the time. Baxter is racked with guilt by the sight of his father sitting semi-coherent, blind, and barely mobile in the dismal nursing home he put him in. Fearing a fate every bit as grim, Baxter finds refuge in stark rituals from his Native American heritage that animate his fitful dreams. Ferguson has found religion, or rather had it forced upon him by his wife, who otherwise wants nothing to do with him. The tedium of his job as an accountant is slowly driving Ferguson around the bend. His one solace: fantasizing about an attractive female co-worker, while Mitchell, who has lost his zest for wheeling and dealing and womanizing, looks for a new thrill. The three longtime friends are approaching middle age kicking and screaming, if only on the inside. That is about to change.

I thought this sounded like a hoot.  I mean grim does not capture what is offered here.  I’m thinking this is a comic novel, the mirth inherent in misery so to speak.

I filed a request for a complimentary review copy and before long I was sent the book.  It’s the first ebook I’d reviewed and after some futzing around, I had the text in place on my Kindle.  I discovered to my dismay that the author and the characters took themselves seriously.  No absurdist guffaws to be found.  The self-pity was pea soup thick.

When I finished the book, I wrote and posted a short review.

This review was written for LibraryThing Early Reviewers.

Losers' Laments

 a review by Michael Casey

Baxter's friends are miserable and morose. Unremittingly.  Baxter himself is nobody you would want to hang out with. When the characters are vacuous and give over what little energy they have to a prolonged piss and moan about their purposeless lives, the narrative needs a dramatic plot to hold the story together. This novel has no such engine. Two thirds of the book is spent voicing a losers’ lament that bemoans frustrating marriages, juvenile lust, and unsatisfying jobs. When some action kicks in it pivots on a desire to commit crime for the thrill of the transgression. It ends in destruction for the hapless trio.

The writing in the narrative is functional but too often marred by odd "sophisticated" diction that hails from a different register than these characters would speak or sound. "Carmative, anility, simulacrum [a favorite of the author], phrenic, punition, and sacrifant" are examples of bon mots that are pearls before swine.

            I suppose it's possible that we were expected to find humor in the parade of hapless males. But humor requires wit, and these dudes are woeful and witless.

So, a negative review that will receive little attention and be counter-voiced by the author’s buddies.  Ordinary stuff.  Finis.  Right?  Not quite.   

An email arrives.  An anonymous email.  It reads:

I tracked down this site after reading your review of Baxter's Friends. You look just like I envisioned as I read your review. I am sorry you didn't understand it. Where are your books, by the way?

I learned that you can reply to an anonymous email even though it’s very difficult to unmask the sender.  So I responded without a specific salutation.  Thusly.

I found Baxter’s Friends a waste of my time to read and review.  You found my review offensive enough that you feel compelled to respond.  So you send a grammatically clumsy comment composed of lame insults.  And you send it anonymously no less.  What a class act you are!  No, I don’t publish books—and that means I’ll never be embarrassed by a poor one.  Can’t say the same for Ned Randle.

          This little dust-up points to the discomforting poking effect of honesty when responding to someone else’s work.  But I think there is an upside.  The author has received additional notice here about his work that could prompt another reader to purchase a copy in order to independently decide about the book’s quality.  And I’ve found and used material for an overdue post on Casey’s whollywrit.  Casey and Randle have served each other’s interests.  I’m a peach of a fella.