The Care and Handling of Roses with Thorns

May 14, 2012
The title is apt to describe Galilee Garner, the prickly protagonist of Dilloway’s second novel (after How to Be an American Housewife). “Gal” has been on dialysis since she was diagnosed with kidney disease as a child and, by her own choosing, has distanced herself from others. She lives a solitary life in central California, her free time spent breeding competition roses and teaching high school biology at a private Catholic school. Her sole friend, Dara, whose frilly ’50s style makes her look like a character from the musical Grease, teaches art at the same school, but Gal’s self-centeredness creates a rift in their relationship. Gal’s autonomy is challenged when her teenage niece Riley arrives unannounced when Riley’s flighty mom, Gal’s sister, goes to Hong Kong on business. Having Riley around slowly softens Gal, drawing her focus away from herself. There’s no mystery that Dilloway’s metaphor, the care needed to keep a rose thriving, is meant to evoke the needs of a child, a friendship, or someone suffering a chronic illness. Dilloway’s tale is slow in reaching the sweet part of Gal’s hardened heart, and this lack of empathy will push some readers away. Agent: Elaine Markson, Markson Thoma.

August 1, 2012
The life of a high school biology teacher parallels her cultivation of roses in Dilloway's (How to Be an American Housewife, 2010) exquisitely written novel about love and redemption. Thirty-six-year-old Galilee Garner suffers from kidney failure, a condition that has defined her life. After undergoing two transplants, which ultimately failed, Gal is back on dialysis while hoping for another kidney. She is insular, obstinate and regimented in her private life, and these attributes have spilled over into her professional life, making her unpopular with many students and their parents. Gal sets the bar high and refuses to cut anyone, including herself, any slack, and she has trouble viewing issues from anyone else's perspective. Socially isolated except for fellow teacher Dara, who often drives Gal to and from her dialysis treatments, and Brad, a star student who helps Gal as part of his senior community service requirement for graduation, Gal rarely goes out. The only time she is relaxed and happy is when she is tending her roses, the one passion Gal allows in her life. A methodical breeder, Gal hopes to develop a rose that will win Queen of Show at competition. When her 15-year-old niece, Riley, appears at her school one day after a seven-year separation, Gal reluctantly allows Riley to move in. She resists the changes that occur in her orderly, measured and exact routine and stubbornly refuses to compromise her principles. But as Riley helps Gal with her roses and they begin to form a bond, she changes in slow but subtle ways. No longer as inflexible as she once was, even when she discovers a disturbing secret about her students, Gal reaches out to a fellow dialysis patient, a new colleague at school and her older sister. A witty and compassionate lesson about the importance of empathy, friendship and family.

COPYRIGHT(2012) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

March 1, 2012

Gal Garner distracts herself from the high school biology class she teaches and the rigors of kidney disease (though she's only 36) by cultivating roses, which she carefully cross-pollinates with the hope of winning Queen of Show in competition. Then her teenage niece, daughter of her estranged sister, arrives without warning and upends everything. Not an uncommon plot, but there's lots of enthusiasm for this second novel, with a special emphasis on book club promotion, and Dilloway's affecting How To Be an American Housewife won strong reviews.

Copyright 2012 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

July 1, 2012
A private-school biology teacher, Gal Garner is known for her prickly personality. Her few friends have learned to cope with her candid outbursts, while school officials find her stubborn intractability hard to condone. To her students, she is one of the toughest taskmasters on the faculty. Yet at home in her rose garden, Gal blossoms into a sensitive, caring romantic as she tries to breed a fragrant species unlike anything on the market. Now in the end stages of kidney failure, Gal has to stick to a rigid dialysis schedule that leaves her little time for anything beyond her small world of school and greenhouse. So the sudden arrival of her teenage niece, Riley, whom she hasn't seen in years, not only throws her carefully constructed world into chaos; it forces both her and Riley to confront issues of estrangement and independence that have nearly torn their family apart. A richly textured diversion from standard treatments of family angst, Dilloway's (How to Be an American Housewife, 2010) new novel expresses a graceful understanding of the virtues of mercy.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)