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This is a comical, effervescent and scintillating novel that will be just ideal for your January doldrums. Andrea Kendricks, to the manner born, wants nothing more than to live her own life, working as a web-site designer. Of course the trust fund left her by her father makes this easier for Andy than for most. Nevertheless her mother Cissy believes she should be attending charity events, cultural occasions, and most of all meeting eligible men. One day she gets a phone call from an old friend with whom she had lost touch. Molly OıBrien had left the art and design school they had been attending together in Chicago to run off with the man of her dreams. When she was pregnant, he had left her. She had ultimately returned to Dallas with her son and was working to support the two of them. She tells Andy she has been arrested, accused of murdering her lecherous boss Bud. Admittedly she had helped close the Jugs Bar and had thrust at him with a knife when he made sexual advances, but she insists that he was alive when she left. Andy gets her mother to provide a lawyer and then, against that lawyerıs advice, decides to investigate herself. She has a legitimate reason, she feels, for the police, having arrested Molly, figure they have the murderer and plan no further investigation. The trouble she finds, the people she meets and sometimes reluctantly lies to, the surprising job she finds herself doing stirs the reader alternately to laugh and to worry about what she might be getting into. The whole dizzying, often exciting story is guaranteed to rivet the readerıs attention and make the book extremely difficult to put down. Andy, as protagonist and narrator, is an enthralling and appealing character. Her voice is unique and fresh; her view of the world is wry and intelligent; and especially when dealing with her mother Cissy she shows signs of impatience, of love, and of determination. She is a wonderful heroine for the modern day. While she scorns her motherıs matchmaking, clearly, deep down inside, she would like to find that perfect man herself. Cissy is a fairly well developed character also, seemingly a typical 'blue blood' but one with compassion and perhaps a sense of humor. She occasionally astonishes Andy by her actions. The other characters are mostly foils for Andy and Cissy. While this is a highly amusing book, with the humor growing out of the charactersı reactions and events and never slapstick comedy, it is not all sweetness and light. McBride never lets us forget the murder at the heart of the book and the woman languishing in jail without her son and with little hope. There is an edginess to the book that sometimes catches us unawares. Another theme that becomes part of the story is the matter of the outsider. Molly was a scholarship student at the expensive prep school that Andy attended. Andy also was not accepted by the other students. She was not interested in any of the things they dwelled on and she preferred art to debutante dances. It is easy to identify with these two women because many of us have been outsiders at one time or another. This is a very well-written intriguing story that grabs the reader from the beginning, giving her laughter and anxiety and absorption. It is not to be missed.
Reviewed by Sally A. Fellows, December 2003
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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)
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