Aviary

January 15, 2021
A suspicious fire at a senior residence profoundly affects the elderly denizens and those around them. The Pheasant Run condo isn't nearly as grand as it sounds. Cassie McMackin, one of its occupants, is counting pills and contemplating suicide when we meet her. Cassie's neighbor Viola Six is worried about paying the rent, having lost her savings to a scam promoted by an ex-beau. Down the hall is Leo Uberti, an Italian Jewish artist with a painful past. Hidden in Viola's basement storage is an abused and bullied 15-year-old, Clayton Spooner. Then there's Herbie Bonebright, the treacherous new manager of the building, apparently involved in a scheme to oust tenants so Pheasant Run can be converted into a more profitable enterprise. One morning, a fire erupts in Herbie's apartment. While the blaze is quickly contained, fire inspector Lander Maki thinks it may be arson. Herbie is suddenly nowhere to be found, and Viola Six has vanished too. But this is no geriatric whodunit, and author McNamer is not so concerned with exposing the perp. (When that revelation finally comes, it's anticlimactic.) She's more interested in the indignities of old age, memory and loss, and what one character calls "the secret of ongoingness." Much of the writing is quite lyrical, as in the description of Maki's "beyond-human" sense of smell: "His olfactory sensitivity had become so intimately intertwined with memory that the smell of a remembered presence arrived in tandem with the smell of its absence." Still, some passages are overwritten, and some plot points seem dubious. The novel also has a bleak undertow, though Maki's wife, Rhonda, an animal whisperer, exudes eccentric charm and brightens the scenes she's in. A quasi-happy ending is preceded by many casualties--some of which seem arbitrary. Richly drawn characters in search of a more compelling narrative.

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March 1, 2021
McNamer's latest novel centers around the seemingly orderly lives of residents in Pheasant Run, a quiet if rundown retirement community in Montana. However, as in the town of Twin Peaks, all is not what it seems, especially after a mysterious apartment fire brings a hidden world to the surface. McNamer masterfully swoops in and out of the experiences of a varied cast of characters, such as the stoic fire inspector, Lander Maki, who lives with his eccentric wife, Rhonda, surrounded by animals, and Clayton Spooner, a teen coping with his father's philandering with a younger woman. The early scenes evoke a wistful sense of loss, grief, and abandonment reminiscent of Kate Walbert's Our Kind (2004) before the narrative smoothly transitions into a fascinating whodunit. McNamer weaves into this narrative the ripple effects of the 2008 financial crisis and the mismanagement of retirement communities, a setting that is particularly relevant now considering the way COVID-19 has ravaged these communities. With beautifully realized characters, a wonderfully constructed plot, and some understated but powerful prose, this novel is a delight from start to finish.

COPYRIGHT(2021) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

April 1, 2021

The aviary of the book's title is a metaphor for a senior apartment complex in an unnamed Montana college town. There is concern among the varied residents regarding deteriorating conditions in the building and the presence of an incompetent and threatening new maintenance man. A fire in an apartment and the disappearance of one of the residents lead to further stress and suspicion. Empathetic fire investigator Lander Maki is brought into the case, while the residents share their theories and cope with their own histories of love and loss. A pair of troubled teenagers, one bullied and the other abused, are also thrown into the mix. Housing precarity, a lack of concern and care for elders, and the necessity of acknowledging the relationship of humans to the natural world are overarching themes. VERDICT With so many (perhaps too many) characters and story threads, one worries whether McNamer (Red Rover) will be able to bring them together by the end, but she does. The conclusion is satisfying, but mention of a mysterious illness afflicting one resident returning from a cruise in early 2020 casts an ominous shadow. Recommended for readers eager for nonquaint novels about seniors.--Christine DeZelar-Tiedman, Univ. of Minnesota Libs., Minneapolis

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