Looking for Mary Gabriel
A Novel
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3.0 • 1 Rating
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
In the tradition of Carson McCullers, the author uses her own experience growing up with a mentally ill sister to pen this intensely moving novel. Set in the heart of the deep South, Looking for Mary Gabriel is the story of Bonita, a young girl who desperately wants her family to be normal, despite their strange behavior. Bonita's little sister, Mary, does not act like the other neighborhood kids, and Bonita vacillates between adoring her sister and hating her. Likewise, Bonita's mother is not exactly as warm and loving as one would hope a mother should be. And Bonita's father's motives are suspect to say the least. Almost inevitably, a tragic act of violence shatters the family forever.
As this exquisitely written novel opens, Bonita is preparing to bury her father and is looking back on a life that was shaped by secrets, madness, and lies. This is a novel that will be passed along from friend to friend, for Looking for Mary Gabriel captures perfectly the lonely young girl whose ultimate triumph over her unlucky past enriches all read of her.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
A tinted review in adult Forecasts indicates a book that's of exceptional importance to our readers but hasn't received a starred or boxed review.LOOKING FOR MARY GABRIELCarole Lawrence. St. Martin's/Dunne, (320p) Stilted storytelling, once-upon-a-time contrivances and the hackneyed theme of parental damage inflicted on innocent children characterize Lawrence's debut coming-of-age novel, which alternates time frames between the '50s and the '90s. As the story opens in 1995, 52-year-old Bonita Gabriel has just learned of her father's death and must notify her sister, Mary, who lives in an institution for the incurably insane, convinced she's Dan Rather's wife. Flash back to their youth in Baton Rouge, La., with parents who sound like the Cleavers, but who have dark secrets and willful obsessions. Mary, from an early age, is different from the other kids, but their father refuses to acknowledge her illness and tells Bonita that she's responsible for her obviously disturbed younger sister. As Bonita prepares for her father's funeral, she reflects on a family history that involved schizophrenia, mysterious death and the antecedents for Bonita's own estrangement from church and family. Although Lawrence movingly portrays a child's confusion and helplessness when faced with parental authority, the suspense of impending doom that hangs over the tale does nothing to mitigate the problem that the callow conversations of youth form far too much of the novel to hold adult attention for long. Everyone talks more na vely than their age, as though stuck forever in a '50s TV program, and the facile ending harps on the theme of Christian forgiveness.
