Home Repair by Liz Rosenberg

Release date: 2009 / 328 pages

Synopsis (from front cover): Eve’s beloved Ivan died thirteen years ago in an automobile accident. Her charming boyish Chuck has taken a different exit out of her life: hopping into his car in the middle of a garage sale with no forewarning and departing their formerly happy upstate New York home for points unknown. Now Eve’s a boat adrift, subsisting on a heartbreak diet of rue, disappointment, and woe — left alone to care for Ivan’s brilliant teenaged son, Marcus, and Chuck’s precocious, pragmatic nine-year-old daughter, Noni while contending with Charlotte, Eve’s acerbic mother, who’s come north to “help” but hinders instead.

First line: “As garage sales go, this was a disaster from the start.”

Review:  This novel was an interesting experience on a number of different levels.  First, I couldn’t help but notice the writer had such an eye for setting a scene, she just had to be a poet.  Second, the narrative was series of events — mostly rather tragic — that occured with little preamble, but then satisfactorily delved into the effects or fall-out of each event.  At times I wondered if this felt a bit disjointed, but then realized that “disjointed” is exactly how tragedies and disappointments leave us. 

I enjoyed each of the characters and would welcome a short story, if not a full novel, from the perspective of each.  I imagine if this were to occur, I would feel that I knew the character intimately by the end — as I did Eve.  The only character in the novel I did not get to know well was Chuck, Eve’s husband who exits her life — and essentially the novel — on page 7.  At first I wanted more of his perspective, but by the end did not feel his absence as a loss.

As I’ve written before, I do not read about a novel before I begin it — no plot summary or critical reviews — but I do love to read the supplemental material at the end of a novel once I’m finished.  So, when I did, I discovered that Rosenberg IS indeed a poet — and that this is her first adult novel.  I also read Rosenberg’s explanation of her writing process: 

…I wrote it over the course of about two years, but I didn’t try to write it chronologically, from beginning to end.  I just wrote whatever scene came most clearly to mind — whatever I wanted to write. Sometimes pieces of scenes, snippets of dialogue… Eventually the scenes began to fall into place, and the plot took shape, with one event hurrying along the next. 

This is exactly how the novel feels, too!  I was gratified to read this, partly because I felt an intuitive connection with Rosenberg’s process, but also because the narrative moves a bit differently than one might expect, and I wasn’t sure how to convey this in my review.  I also read that Rosenberg teaches creative writing at Binghamton University — which may be why she is able to deftly make a somewhat unconventional narrative work.

Last interesting tidbit I found — at the end Rosenberg identifies her “ideal reader:”

My ideal reader for Home Repair is anyone who has ever been left alone in the middle of his or her life. But it’s also for the woman sitting in the hospital waiting room, trying to distract herself. It’s for the insomniac — the man awake reading at three thirty in the morning. That’s why I write, to comfort those people and to keep them company. I have no doubt about that, and have never had any doubt about that.

So, if this description fits you — or my review was intriguing – and you would like a chance to win a free copy, simply leave me a comment!  I have to mention that I read this while travelling, during a bumpy flight, and a small drop of tomato juice settled into a few pages.  Normally I am fortunate enough to read most of my giveaways quickly, in the pristine comfort of my reading room, so they truly are “as good as new” — I’m afraid this one appears just a bit “lived in”

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