Review by New York Times Review
MOST of us have dreams of glory, imagining those 15 minutes when everybody who's anybody knows who we are and what we're famous for. Writers are particularly susceptible to this fantasy. And now that the Internet spreads the news even before it happens, our pirouette in the spotlight seems closer than ever. Crusty, reclusive Amy Gallup had an early brush with success, but her last book was published 30 years ago. As far as she's concerned, her career is over - except it isn't. Trotting out to the garden with an unwieldy Norfolk pine, she's about to be famous again. Jincy Willett, who let a thin woman and her fat twin flirt with renown in her lively first novel, "Winner of the National Book Award," drops Amy back into the fray in her new literary satire. Although details have been changed to protect the innocent and hype the flaws of the guilty, Amy might be Willett's alter ego. Naturally, Amy and Alphonse, her diffident basset hound, have aged since Willett's second novel, "The Writing Class," in which a sniper took deadly aim at the workshop Amy reluctantly teaches (because even writers need to eat). Feeling old and fat and forgotten, she's trudging outside to plant her tree when, distracted by Alphonse, she slips and knocks herself out on the birdbath. The dog merely looks on "sardonically, as though Amy windmilling through the air were a daily spectacle." In her befuddled state, Amy gives a garbled interview to a woman doing a feature article for the local San Diego paper and slams the front door, with no idea what she's just said. After a night of speculation and avoidance, she finally visits the emergency room, "which was full of seated patients, many of whom had apparently grown up there." Hours later, a bag lady thrusts the morning newspaper in Amy's face. Banner headline: ENCHANTED IN ESCONDIDO. Photo of Amy. The works. Web crawlers make Amy's saga go viral. Her onetime agent, not heard from in ages, gets back in touch. In short order, Amy's giving outrageously awkward radio and television interviews. Audiences love it. Soon she's parrying and thrusting with talk show hosts and pontificating on panels with literary lights. These exchanges are for the most part funny, but Amy's encounters with the students from her writing class are livelier. These strivers include a dowager from La Jolla who plans to turn her "soporifically humid" mansion, complete with indoor lagoon, into a writers' retreat, two doctors (one of whom has written "an anti-H.M.O. novel") and a young man whose latest effort involves a horde of serial killers implanted with time-delay triggers to set off the slaughter. Assorted others walk around in their descriptions and not much else. Amy cares more about Alphonse than she does about anybody - well, she likes her agent a little bit - although she does have some good moments with the author of the serial-killer novel, who helps rearrange her library (and asks to borrow "Constipation in Adults and Children"). Essentially, Amy is a character who lives inside her head, and she needs to get out more. The cast surrounding her doesn't, in fact, seem to be Willett's central concern. The past stands between Amy and the rest of her life. She's too deeply engaged with her literary psyche and memories of Max, her long-lost gay husband, to reach out to anybody. Her flashbacks to times when she and Max were happy (on separate honeymoons) before he died of AIDS are the most powerful parts of the novel. This was when "Amy could see through to the truth, that there was just this pitiless void, and the two of them inside it, tiny, withering." After taking a fall, Amy Gallup gives an outrageous interview - and her story goes viral. Kit Reed's most recent books are a novel, "Son of Destruction," and a collection of short fiction, "The Story Until Now.
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [July 7, 2013]
Review by Booklist Review
In this sequel to the events that ended Willett's The Writing Class (2008), erstwhile novelist turned online writing instructor Amy Gallup stumbles in her backyard just minutes before being interviewed for a where-are-the-has-beens-of-yesteryear article. It can only be assumed that her skull's brief contact with a concrete birdbath is what transformed Amy from an irascible wag to an insouciant wit. Whatever the cause, suddenly Amy is hot again. After the article goes viral, her former agent resurfaces, booking her on NPR and scoring profiles in mainstream media, and she's the A-list guest for literary panels discussing such egregious topics as Whither Publishing? Best yet, Amy's creative muse also reappears, and short stories spew forth as if out of the ether. It's a heady ride for the one-time recluse, showing her that, hey, maybe success isn't so bad after all. For anyone who has ever wondered what it's like to be an author, Willett's thinly veiled heroine provides a saucily irreverent look at the writing life.--Haggas, Carol Copyright 2010 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Willett's hilarious follow-up to The Writing Class pulls no punches when it comes to current literary trends. Amy Gallup was once heralded as a fresh voice in fiction, but with her novels now long out of print, she's content with a quiet, anonymous life of leading workshops, keeping lists of great-sounding titles for stories she'll never write, and maintaining her sporadically updated blog. One afternoon, however, while working in her garden, Amy trips and cold-cocks herself on a birdbath. Still reeling from the head injury hours later, she gives a loopy interview to a reporter working on a series of local author profiles. The result goes viral, and suddenly Amy is a hot commodity on the literary pundit trail. She couldn't care less about being relevant or famous, which lends a refreshingly brutal honesty to her commentary on the radio, television, and lecture circuit. But her newfound notoriety also pushes Amy out of her comfort zone, forcing her to confront years of neuroses and an unexamined postwriting life. Willett uses her charmingly filterless heroine as a mouthpiece to slam a parade of thinly veiled literati and media personalities with riotous accuracy, but she balances the snark with moments of poignancy. (July) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
Willett's previous book, The Writing Class, introduced readers to the wonderfully acerbic author/creative writing teacher Amy Gallup. That novel was a regular whodunit, but this sequel is not in the mystery genre at all. Rather, it is a lovingly gentle but thorough skewering of the current literary world, the media surrounding it, and the "authors-as-brands" who often populate it. The novel opens with Amy falling and hitting her head on a birdbath. Long afraid of doctors and hospitals, she doesn't immediately seek treatment but instead gives an interview to a local newspaper journalist-a young woman who's featuring Amy in a "whatever happened to" article. (Amy's debut novel at 22 was a tremendous success, but nothing in the resulting 40 years quite lived up to the potential promised by it.) Amy's incoherent ramblings set off a chain of events featuring her as a straight talker surrounded by pretentiousness. Verdict Funny and whip-smart about the modern book world, Willett's novel is also profound and touching on relationships, aging, and self-reflection. Absolutely recommended, whether or not you read The Writing Class, and especially if you're a voracious reader or a writer, a publisher, a critic, or a book blogger. [See Prepub Alert, 1/25/13.]-Amy Watts, Univ. of Georgia Lib., Athens (c) Copyright 2013. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
Amy Gallup, 60, hasn't published a book in 20 years, and she's settled into a quiet life with her beloved basset hound, Alphonse. None too excited about a newspaper interview she's agreed to give, she trips, knocking herself out on the birdbath just hours before she's scheduled to play the role of has-been local writer. Oddly, she regains consciousness to see the reporter's car pulling out of her driveway. In the emergency room later, she has the distinct pleasure of reading her own interview--an interview she evidently gave without the assistance of a conscious, rational mind. Amy's cryptic, concussion-addled interview rejuvenates her career. Suddenly, her agent--chain-smoking, aggressive but kindly Maxine--is calling again, arranging appearances and pushing for new material. Her former writing students are back, too. After all, their crazed, knife-wielding former classmate (from Willett's The Writing Class, 2008) is now safely behind bars. The collection of friends and opponents surrounding Amy are flat characters bedazzled with quirks, but that doesn't quite make them quirky. Grudgingly, Amy goes on tour, battling wits with shrill, book-phobic radio hosts, twitter-bewitched moderators, new authors drunk on blogs and old authors drunk on scotch. Along the way, she confronts the demons of her past, including her buried grief for her late, gay husband, as well as her ambivalence about success. The skewering of the business of selling books--despite some hilarious scenes and Amy's dry humor--gets repetitive as Amy tirelessly defends real writing and debunks virtual book launches. Amy is endearing, yet it is difficult to remain curious about a heroine whose only interest is writing. Willett's skill in crafting zany scenes and Amy's acerbic wit are not enough to keep this novel afloat.]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
