2 weeks Ago By Reviewed by Rory Runnells
DEATH , by bestselling East Coast novelist and columnist Lesley Crewe, deals with the year-long complications faced by 62-year-old Margo following the sudden death of her (as she learns) deceiving, gambling second husband, Dick. Read this article for free: Already have an account? To continue reading, please subscribe: * DEATH , by bestselling East Coast novelist and columnist Lesley Crewe, deals with the year-long complications faced by 62-year-old Margo following the sudden death of her (as she learns) deceiving, gambling second husband, Dick. Read unlimited articles for free today: Already have an account? DEATH , by bestselling East Coast novelist and columnist Lesley Crewe, deals with the year-long complications faced by 62-year-old Margo following the sudden death of her (as she learns) deceiving, gambling second husband, Dick.
Set in Fredericton and the rural environs of New Brunswick, the novel details Margo’s struggles as she ceases being dependent on her children, uptight Julia and loosey goosey Mike, as well as her bemused first ex-husband Monty and frazzled siblings, to embrace independence and confidence in herself. Thrown into the mix is the hostility shown by Dick’s angry daughter and ex-wife. The theme here is that everyone in the book of any age must “grow up.
” Death and Other Inconveniences This idea is pounded in, but unfortunately centring it on Margo herself doesn’t help the story. In her passive-aggressive manner with others, Margo is always morally right, if socially awkward or uncomfortable and, of course, more wonderfully adaptable than anyone in her life. We are never really shown how or why this is, but are told instead by everyone else.
For that matter, her messy difficulties are primarily solved by her family. While there are many points of view throughout about Margo, this doesn’t guarantee cohesion, since coming back to Margo as the book’s centre often stalls the narrative. The best section of is when the novel’s hectic pace slows down to concentrate on son Mike and his longtime partner, Olenka, a student of animal behaviour.
Their relationship is the most compelling; it seems lived and not just described. For example, Olenka’s way of dealing with the world, including her own surprising pregnancy, is to compare it with the animal world. While intriguing, ultimately her observations are there mainly to bolster the book’s cosy delight about Margo’s ability to adapt as an older woman.
No matter, though; all problems dissolve, and a grandmother’s love rights every wrong. There is even a kind of peace reached with the angry stepdaughter and her mother. It’s sweet-corn prose, comfortable to read and perhaps, for some readers, comforting to recall.
Yet is there a faint smugness lurking? It isn’t quite authorial contempt — Crewe loves her characters, for sure — but the ever-present zingers (everyone in this world can easily wisecrack) reflect a lazy wit, a private uneasy chortling which is hard to ignore. Monday mornings The latest local business news and a lookahead to the coming week. Pop culture references of a generation or so back abound.
A pet cat, for example, startles Margo in the shower, and she inevitably invokes Janet Leigh’s shock in . To add another pop culture reference, by way of the witch in Stephen Sondheim’s : “You’re nice, you’re not bad, you’re not good, you’re just..
. nice.” There’s nothing wrong with being nice.
Still, the reader may want to bypass the human beings of and stick with the book’s pets: cats Stan and Magoo, and donkeys Fred and Ginger. They’re sweet as well but demanding, troublesome and always interesting — unlike their owners. Rory Runnells is a Winnipeg writer.
Death and Other Inconveniences By Lesley Crewe Vagrant Press, 280 pages, $25 Advertisement Advertisement.
