God Shaped Hole

April 15, 2002
In the brief prelude to this conventional contemporary love story, a fortune-teller predicts that Beatrice Jordan (then 12) will meet a soul mate whom she'll lose to tragedy. Fifteen years later, lonely and feeling like an outsider in her hometown of Los Angeles, this self-professed "cynical but lovable...chick" impulsively answers a personal ad in a weekly newspaper. Jacob Grace is two years her senior, a freelancer with a novel called Hallelujah
in progress; Beatrice's work as a jewelry designer gives her life meaning, as do music, books and sex, not necessarily in that order. Both of their fathers—hers a workaholic lawyer, his an alcoholic author—decamped, and they still feel abandoned; they also both feel that music is "a cosmic language" and that people are "all searching to fill up" the titular hole in their souls. Jacob renames Beatrice "Trixie" and takes her for a midnight swim in the frigid Pacific before they bed down in her apartment. Their ensuing relationship is sensuous, but marred by her jealousy of his former girlfriend, his fondness for taking solo sojourns without notice and their shared antagonism toward their fathers. Beatrice comes across as bright but brittle, independent but superstitious, sophisticated but trailer-park profane. Jacob is Byronic, misunderstood and (of course) destined for tragedy. For readers compelled by bedroom athletics and the self-destructive tendencies of free spirits, and unopposed to prose that's not much better than competent, this first novel offers some appeal.

April 15, 2002
Beatrice "Trixie" Jordan, a lonely, 27-year-old jewelry designer living in Los Angeles, responds to a personal ad from a man "seeking a friend for the end of the world." The man is Jacob Grace, a 30-year-old writer. They fall madly in love and believe they are soul mates. Abandoned by their fathers, they spend much of their time helping each other come to terms with their feelings. After enduring some emotionally desperate times, they hope better days are ahead and plan to leave L.A. and spend the rest of their lives together. However, when Beatrice was 12, a fortune-teller told her that her true love would die young. First-time novelist DeBartolo, writer and director of the film Dream for an Insomniac, has written an edgy story of love and fate rife with expletives and sex. This is a love story in which a happy ending isn't guaranteed. Some readers may be unfamiliar with some of the pop-culture references and may not appreciate the frank and brutally honest tone, but overall this is an engaging first novel. For public libraries. Samantha J. Gust, Niagara Univ. Lib., NY

Copyright 2002 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

April 15, 2002
DeBartolo's debut novel opens with a chilling prophecy: a fortune teller tells 12-year-old Beatrice Jordan that she will one day lose her true love. Fifteen years later, Beatrice, now a cautious loner all but estranged from her family, answers a personal ad that intrigues her. Jacob Grace, the man who placed the ad, is a kindred spirit--both have absent, negligent fathers, and both hate L.A and long for a life elsewhere. Soon Jacob and Beatrice, whom he calls "Trixie," fall deeply in love, and the two begin to make plans to leave California and head to the Southeast. Jacob works diligently on his novel, which is their ticket out of L.A., while Trixie designs beautiful, unique jewelry. But both have unresolved issues with their truant fathers, and their relationship might not survive the strain of dealing with them. And Trixie continues to be haunted by the prophecy that she will lose the man she loves. Honest, raw, and engaging, this is a compelling first novel with two alluring characters at its center.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2002, American Library Association.)