Edgar and Lucy

January 30, 2017
The sprawling second novel by the author of Mathilda Savitch zooms in on its two title characters to the near-exclusion of everything else. Edgar is eight when the novel opens. Albino and borderline autistic, he’s having a hard time making it in urban New Jersey, and he finds himself tempted to take the protection offered by a mysterious bearded middle-aged man who is often found patrolling his neighborhood in a pickup truck. Edgar’s widowed mother, Lucy, does her best to care for him, but she’s still haunted by her dead husband and chafing under the household rule of her stern Italian mother-in-law, with whom she and Edgar live. The novel has the plot of a much briefer book, and, while some readers may revel in its rich description, others will find it self-indulgent. Secondary characters come across as more quirky than credible, and the introduction of the point of view of a ghostly character disrupts the flow of the narrative. Scenes set in the deserted woods of the New Jersey Pine Barrens have an eerie power, as do flashbacks to the early years of Lucy’s marriage. While the plot is suspenseful enough to keep the pages turning, Lovado blunts the edges of difficult subjects such as suicide and child endangerment, making for an emotionally easier story. 125,000-copy announced first printing. Agent: Bill Clegg, the Clegg Agency.

January 1, 2017
The life of a young albino boy in suburban New Jersey is permanently marked by two tragedies, neither of his making.Playwright and novelist Lodato's debut novel (Mathilda Savitch, 2009) was a sublime coming-of-age story about a young girl. In his ambitious but less focused follow-up, the author switches genders to focus on the life-changing events that shape an 8-year-old boy. It's a dark mirror of Lodato's debut, filled with menace and grief that takes no less than seven weighty passages to play out. The child is Edgar Allan Fini, who has "pale skin, white hair, tired eyes a sea-glass shade of green." To his mother, Lucy, an alcoholic hair stylist, he's "her funny little albino fruitcake." But as Lodato starts building out Lucy and Edgar's world with meticulous detail, he's also lacing the tale with ill intent. First there is the matter of Frank Fini, Edgar's manic-depressive father, who committed suicide by plunging his car off a cliff, nearly taking Lucy with him. There's Edgar's grandmother Florence, who wields such influence over the boy that she continues to muse over his fate even after her death. We have the butcher with whom Lucy is sleeping, who accidentally severs Edgar's finger. Lucy herself is still shattered by Frank's death, to the degree that she tells her lover "please don't be happy" when she finds herself pregnant. It's a dark tale told in stolen moments and silent reflections, and it gets darker as time passes. The final half of the book depicts the strange relationship between Edgar and a man named Conrad who committed a terrible trespass against his own son. These characters hurtle toward a climax that begins to defy plausibility--the author ties things up with a jarring change in voice at the end--but readers who make it that far are apt to be enraptured already. A domestic fable about grief and redemption likely to leave readers emotionally threadbare.

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Starred review from December 15, 2016
Edgar Fini is an unusual eight-year-old, marked by albinism, obsessive-compulsive tendencies, and weird predilections. An accident claimed the life of his father while Edgar was a baby, and his doting grandmother and immature mother keep the incident shrouded in mystery. The constant fighting between these two important figures creates a troubled home for Edgar, until his beloved grandmother dies unexpectedly. When his mother, Lucy, seems too busy with booze and a new boyfriend to notice his unbearable grief, a stranger in a truck is suddenly there to offer the solace Edgar craves. As Lodato, author of the highly acclaimed Mathilda Savitch (2009), opens up his characters' pasts, Lucy's absence becomes more sympathetic in light of her own traumatic history and the weight of the illness and death of Edgar's father. The passing of her mother-in-law hits her harder than she anticipates, but it isn't until Edgar goes missing that Lucy truly hits rock bottom. From there, with the help of the new man in her life, maybe she can crawl back up before it's too late. Through numerous changing viewpoints, the truth is gradually revealed, creating suspense and rewarding readers with unexpected parallels and touching connections. Lodato's remarkable novel traces a broken family's spiritual journey toward healing in moving, magical prose.HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: A 125,000 print run, a national author tour, and a major marketing campaign ensure reader excitement for this rising literary star.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)

October 15, 2016

Lodato, who made his fiction debut with Mathilda Savitch, winner of the PEN USA Award for Fiction and the Barnes & Noble Discover Award, returns with the story of eight-year-old Edgar Fini. After his father's suicide, Edgar bonds with his grandmother, mother Lucy being preoccupied with the men in her life. Then his grandmother dies, and Lucy is just getting the hang of motherhood when the mysterious Conrad whisks Edgar away to create their own little home. With a national tour.

Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from December 1, 2016

Lucy and her son, Edgar, have lived in New Jersey with her mother-in-law since her husband killed himself. Lucy is not a responsible mother, but Florence takes care of Edgar, a strangely intelligent, hypersensitive eight-year-old. When Florence suddenly dies, things fall apart, and Edgar is rather willingly kidnapped by a mysterious man who has been lurking around the area. He takes Edgar to a remote cabin in the Pine Barrens of southern New Jersey, while a frantic Lucy and the local police launch an inept missing-person investigation. As months go by, Lucy tries to carry on with her life, while Edgar negotiates his way through the strange new place he has arrived at with his kidnapper, who is now acting like a surrogate father and seems to have some mission for Edgar to fulfill. VERDICT Flirting with danger on many fronts, this second novel from the author of the award-winning Mathilda Savitch is perceptive, compassionate, and humorous, drawing readers into the lives of these quirky yet recognizable and sympathetic characters. [See Prepub Alert, 9/19/16.]--James Coan, SUNY at Oneonta Lib.

Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

December 1, 2016

Lucy and her son, Edgar, have lived in New Jersey with her mother-in-law since her husband killed himself. Lucy is not a responsible mother, but Florence takes care of Edgar, a strangely intelligent, hypersensitive eight-year-old. When Florence suddenly dies, things fall apart, and Edgar is rather willingly kidnapped by a mysterious man who has been lurking around the area. He takes Edgar to a remote cabin in the Pine Barrens of southern New Jersey, while a frantic Lucy and the local police launch an inept missing-person investigation. As months go by, Lucy tries to carry on with her life, while Edgar negotiates his way through the strange new place he has arrived at with his kidnapper, who is now acting like a surrogate father and seems to have some mission for Edgar to fulfill. VERDICT Flirting with danger on many fronts, this second novel from the author of the award-winning Mathilda Savitch is perceptive, compassionate, and humorous, drawing readers into the lives of these quirky yet recognizable and sympathetic characters. [See Prepub Alert, 9/19/16.]--James Coan, SUNY at Oneonta Lib.

Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.