The Flying Troutmans

July 21, 2008
A road novel helped along by a lovably nutty cast, Toews’s latest (after A Complicated Kindness
) follows a ragtag crew as they crisscross America. Hattie, recently dumped in Paris by her “moody, adjective-hating boyfriend,” returns home to Canada after receiving an emergency phone call from her niece. Turns out, Hattie’s sister, Min, is back in the psych ward, and her kids, 11-year-old Thebes and 15-year-old Logan, are fending for themselves. Thus the quirky trio—purple-haired, wise-beyond-her-years Thebes, recently expelled brother Logan and overwhelmed Hattie—embark on a road trip to the States to find the kids’ long-missing father. What follows is a Little Miss Sunshine
–like quest in which the characters learn about themselves and each other as they weather car repairs, sleazy motel rooms and encounters with bizarre people. Toews’s gift for writing precocious children and the story’s antic momentum redeem the familiar set-up, and if the ending feels a bit rushed, it’s largely because it’s tough to let Toews’s characters go.

September 1, 2008
The Troutman world is falling apartagain. Mentally ill Min is bed-ridden and suffering from paranoid delusions; her 15-year-old son, Logan, is in trouble at school; and her 11-year-old daughter, Thebes, is trying and failing to hold it all together. Enter a reluctant and clueless Aunt Hattie, recently dumped by her boyfriend in the City of Light, and the stage is set for this latest book by Toews ("Boy of Good Breeding"). After the suicidal Min is carried to the hospital, Hattie decides to take the kids on a road trip across the Canadian border into America to find the children's AWOL father. The odyssey is laced with moments of grief and dotted with the quirky places, people, and incidents one might expect to find on a circuitous journey through the hinterlands of the vast American West. Ultimately, the long road leads to the beginning of healing and the faith and strength to keep carrying on. Engaging, humorous, grim, and redemptive, this is essential reading; recommended for public libraries.Jyna Scheeren, Troy P.L., NY

Copyright 2008 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

September 1, 2008
Is suicide a choice or a foregone conclusion? When Hattie rushes home to Canada, she is not exactly perturbed by the sight of her sister, who has beenlanguishing in a sickly stew of depression. As Hattie acknowledges, Mins been traveling in two opposite directions at once, towards infancy and death since forever, and it is Hatties job to pick up the pieces. After tenderly depositing her sister in the psych ward, Hattie surveys the scene at home featuringThebes, the eccentric, purple-haired 11-year-old with a penchant for hyperbole and hip-hop vernacular, and Logan, the staunchly silent yet preternaturally wise teenage nephew. A fear of social workers sparks Hattie to pack the minivan and take her sisters kids west on an off-kilter road trip. Destination: their long-lost father. Misadventures, manyvery funny, plague the scarred but resilient Troutmans.Toews (A Complicated Kindness, 2004) excels here atcomedic sophistication, all while masterfully embedding explorations of madness, truth, and the immense sorrow that comes from caring for someone who is derailedby manias devious tug.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2008, American Library Association.)