A Saint from Texas

Starred review from April 6, 2020
White (The Unpunished Vice) serves up a mesmerizing sensual history of identical twin sisters who leave their booming Texas oil town for Paris and a Colombian convent. As teens in 1950s Ranger, Tex., Yvonne and Yvette Crawford are as different as can be. Yvonne listens to top-10 radio hits, reads women’s magazines, and aspires to French aristocracy and a career in fashion; Yvette, with a “crush on God,” prefers Bach and performing acts of charity. Both are determined to escape their small-minded, oil-rich abusive father and social climbing stepmother. Most of the retrospective narrative comes from Yvonne’s point of view, focusing on her sumptuous experience in Paris, where she travels for her college junior year abroad and instantly immerses herself in haute couture. Surrounded by a plenitude of Givenchy and marrons glaces, Yvonne soon marries Adhéaume de Courcy, whom she characterizes as a “spendthrift, unloving, snobbish popinjay.” The marriage contract is simple: his title for her money. Meanwhile, Yvette’s success as a miracle-working nun in Jericó, Colombia, is revealed in a series of letters sprinkled throughout, which include details of Yvette’s amorous friendship with a fellow nun. Yvonne is also romantically interested in women, and White elevates his delicious descriptions of Yvonne’s lecherous thoughts about a sorority sister with notes of Yvonne’s mature self-awareness. Bombshell revelations abound when the narrative reaches its boiling point, which White handles with aplomb. Equally tender and salacious, White’s deeply satisfying character study demonstrates his profound abilities. Agent: Peter Straus, RCW Literary Agency.

June 1, 2020
Twin girls from Texas oil money go on to fabulous destinies. "We moved as far away from Daddy as we could get--to Colombia in my case, to Paris in yours. Neither of us lives in our native language. I'm called Sister and you're called Baroness. We never returned to Texas." The National Book Foundation gave White a lifetime achievement award in 2019 and his latest book might be seen as a fun thank-you gift to readers. Though this high-spirited confection is something of a departure for an author known as a cultural critic and chronicler of contemporary gay culture, it's steeped in White's ironic worldview and mines both his well-known obsessions (France, the French, their language) and lesser-known ones (Catholicism, convent life, the path to sainthood). And, come to think of it, there are plenty of gay and bi characters, and really eloquent descriptions of genitalia. "Our mother had named us out of a movie fan magazine, Yvonne and Yvette, but she was so ignorant she said our names "Why-Von" and "Why-Vet"...We were 14 and real Texas beauties with our blond hair, tiny ears, long legs, and high breasts, though our...mother made us cover them up with extra-large blouses." After their mother died and their father remarried, "All that changed under Bobbie Jean. She made us say our names in the proper French way and corrected our old relatives who mispronounced them--'I'm sorry, ' Bobbie Jean said, 'but we're not that country.' " By the time the girls' story ends in far-flung corners of the globe with both high crimes and miracles to their names, they are certainly not country anymore. Narrated by Yvonne with long letters from Yvette, including cameos by Givenchy, Audrey Hepburn, and Jacqueline Bouvier, the novel brims with wit and style. Proust meets John Irving in this grand and delightful comedy of manners.

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July 1, 2020
There were once twin sisters, Yvette and Yvonne Crawford from East Texas. One marries into French nobility while the other turns away from her Baptist upbringing toward Catholicism. Although family and sibling relationships form the thrust of the novel, White's tale also delves into class and sexuality, money and religion, and unspeakable acts of violence and betrayal, terrible secrets that lie hidden. White allows his languid fable to flow slowly and effortlessly. The author of many works of fiction and nonfiction, White imagines the minds of two Texas beauties with our blond hair, tiny ears, long legs, and high breasts." He also makes lighthearted fun of the manners of the French upper class into which Yvonne marries. Despite the wildly different choices they make in life, these women remain not only sisters but the best of friends. I was bad, says Yvonne, who narrates, but not as bad as long as she was my double, my frail ambassador. A fine shaggy-dog story that ranges from the Texas prairie to the streets of Paris and even a convent in Colombia.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2020, American Library Association.)