Heart of Junk

Starred review from October 28, 2019
Geddes’s rambunctious, oddly touching debut homes in on the denizens of a massive Kansas antique mall. The small-scale purveyors of what the less sensitive would call junk are pinning their hopes on the arrival of the production crew for the TV show Pickin’ Fortunes. Unfortunately, the hosts of the show are leery to come to a town where a little girl, beauty pageant star Lindy Bobo, has disappeared, possibly kidnapped. So mall owner Keith, on the brink of bankruptcy, enlists the rest of the troupe to find her, unaware that one of his sellers knows more than he’s saying about Lindy’s whereabouts. Geddes assembles an irresistible cast of self-deluded characters. This includes uptight Margaret, a stickler for the rules and desperate to repress her attraction to a fellow seller; hapless Ronald, too friendly for his own good; high-strung Delores, “dizzied by all the voices” of the Barbies who keep her company; and Seymour, a big-city vinyl album aficionado hauled to the sticks by his partner Lee. Geddes walks an edgy tightrope with some of the material, particularly the Lindy story, but his antic comic touch saves the novel from sinking into darkness, and he offers even his most misguided characters the opportunity to bumble towards redemption. This one’s a quirky treat for fans of flyover state humor.

An ensemble of narrators works together to memorably portray life at a failing antiques mall in Wichita, Kansas. Each chapter is told from the point of view of one of seven characters. Particularly impressive is the consistent presentation of these characters, who interact with each other in every chapter, by all the narrators. While each narrator is excellent, standout performances come from Arthur Morey's rendering of the befuddled widower, Ronald, along with Samantha Desz's evocation of the judgmental Margaret and conveyance of Delores, who has a unique relationship with her Barbie doll collection. The anticipated arrival of two "Antique Roadshow" style television hosts, as well as the disappearance of a child pageant princess, keeps this darkly comedic audiobook moving at an engaging pace. M.J. � AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine