Unreliable

February 27, 2017
Writing instructor and failed novelist Edwin Stith, the narrator of this irksome suspense novel from Irby (The Up and Up), teaches at Notting College, “a leafy liberal arts school” in Ithaca, N.Y. Stith—who may or may not have killed his ex-wife and others—is a paranoid mess and envisions murdering women while waiting to be charged with a crime. His love-hate relationship with his ex-wife was complicated by another bond, this one with a former student who enjoys sleeping with well-endowed men and sending the impotent Stith the photographic evidence. His life becomes exponentially more convoluted when he meets his future family members at his mother’s wedding in Richmond, Va., and becomes entangled in a shady arms deal that may be connected to a domestic terrorism attack. The unreliable narrator shtick gets old fast, especially since Stith can be insufferable. The startling revelation at the end makes up only in part for the passages about Stith’s delusions and his obsession with the part of his anatomy he refers to as his phantom limb. Agent: Sharon Bowers, Miller Bowers Griffin Literary Management.

February 1, 2017
A downtrodden professor returns home for his mother's wedding. Mayhem ensues.From the beginning, Edwin Stith makes it clear that he is a liar. Or maybe he isn't. Or maybe he's a painfully honest liar. Either way, the title isn't just there for show. When Eddie goes home to Richmond, Virginia, for his mother's wedding, he isn't all that impressed with her fiance, Mead George (who's only five years Eddie's senior and hoards firearms), and his kids, son Graves and daughter Gibson. They're a strange trio, but Eddie does want his mother to be happy. Unfortunately, he's still brokenhearted from a messy divorce, he may (or may not) have killed someone, and he agonizes over his (maybe) relationship with one of his students, the feisty and fiery Lola LaSalle. Theirs is an interesting setup: since Eddie suffers from erectile dysfunction (which he constantly opines on), Lola sleeps with well-endowed men and documents the hookups in photos, which she texts to Eddie. After reconnecting with his wealthy high school sweetheart, Leigh Rose Wardell (who may be crazy), Eddie considers breaking things off with Lola, but she's not having it and texts Eddie that she's on her way to Richmond. Panic follows, and it doesn't help that Eddie finds himself in the middle of a (possibly) shady arms deal and refereeing Mead's strange kids. Narrator Eddie, as self-deprecating as he is, still manages to be obnoxious, the over-the-top story threads never really come together, and Irby takes the unreliable narrator trope to absurdist levels. Many literary allusions to Edgar Allan Poe and the like and some interesting tidbits on Richmond and its storied history can't save what is, ultimately, a painfully self-conscious concoction that tries too hard. Will Eddie make it to the wedding? Will he ever find love again? Is he really a killer? Unfortunately, by the time readers reach the overwrought conclusion, they may not care.

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