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A Density of Souls | |||
A Density of Souls |
There's murder, suicide, and madness at the heart of this rather clumsy coming-of-age story, which focuses on the youthful friendship of Stephen Conlin, Meredith Ducote, Greg Darby, and Brandon Charbonnet. This friendship is destroyed by a sexual incident that takes place just before the foursome enters Cannon, an exclusive prep school. There, Stephen is ostracized by his former friends, now the most popular kids on campus, who'd just as soon forget their own complicity in the event. Envy, passion, and rage drive the narrative, but the emotions are as juvenile as the characters, and the long passages depicting the rituals and cruelties of high school, from pep rallies to football games, slow down the pace without really illuminating character or motivation. The novel reads like a roman à clef. Rice might have been wiser to tell someone else's story rather than his own. --Jane Adams --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Publishers Weekly
Chronicling the lives of four tormented youths, 21-year-old author Rice's earnestly overwritten debut novel flails wildly and suffers from an identity crisis as awkward and vivid as that of his soul-seared characters. Yet the book offers an intriguing, complex story, a hard-nosed, lyrical, teenage take on Peyton Place set in contemporary New Orleans. The tangle of a plot grows weedlike when former childhood friends enter high school and find their loyalties have dramatically shifted. Popular, budding bulimic Meredith Ducote is a closet alcoholic whose diaries brim with morose aphorisms on her wretched life; Greg Darby and Brandon Charbonnet are boisterously homophobic high school jocks; and Stephen Conlin, whose father committed suicide, is the sensitive homosexual boy who quickly becomes the victim of cruelty and derision from the school's popular crowd, led by Greg and Brandon. But the two bullies are covering up a painful childhood secret in their persecution of Stephen, a secret Meredith knows. Before the novel reveals this secret during the overwrought climax set during a devastating hurricane, one character dies, another has an emotional breakdown, a parent is institutionalized, a gay bar is bombed by a militant hate group, a concealed paternity is discovered and several families are broken up. Rice is sensitive to the emotional undercurrents that compel teenagers to both mask and wallow in their intense feeling, but the atmosphere of juvenile angst that pervades the novel is as gluey and suffocating as a hot summer on the bayou. 20-city author tour. (Aug.) doubt is why the name "Rice" dominates the book's jacket.
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
The New York Times Book Review, Jennifer Reese
It's scarily sincere and ultimately preposterous. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
-The Village Voice, July 2000
"Tormented families...unspeakable secrets...a blood-thirsty young man. No, its not Anne Rice, but her 21-year-old son, Christopher." --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
USA Today, August 31, 2000
"...a chillingly perverse tale in which secrets are buried, then unearthed...very earnest plot." --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From AudioFile
James Daniels is the voice of grief and fear in this thriller about four teenagers caught in a web of lies. In high school the four friends are forever changed by violent deaths that are discovered to be murders. Five years later, they rejoin to solve the mystery but discover that only deeper secrets have emerged. Such a rich cast of characters presents a real challenge to any reader, but Daniels pulls this audiobook off with professionality and ingenuity. His careful vocal delineation of characters results in a colorful production that is engaging. . .while scaring the pants off you at the same time. R.A.P. © AudioFile 2000, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine --This text refers to the Audio Cassette edition.
From Booklist
Anne Rice's son's first novel is a gothic, filled with looming buildings, fiercely guarded secrets, and tormented characters. It opens in a graveyard with four friends playing hide-and-seek. When these four friends (Meredith, Stephen, Brandon, and Greg) enter high school, their relationships change drastically. Now football players, Brandon and Greg ostracize and ridicule Stephen for being gay. Meredith allies herself with the popular crowd and begins dating Greg. Their world is jarred again when Greg's younger brother Alex is killed, and Greg commits suicide. From this point, the story jumps ahead five years, as Jordan, Brandon's older brother, returns home and tries to find out what happened to Brandon, who was sent away from home shortly after Greg's suicide. In his quest to find out what happened to his brother, Jordan discovers more about this huge cast of characters than he bargained for. From this point, the narrative really takes off as the characters are forced to deal with each other and with their own inner demons. Although the gothic gloom is a little heavy for the high-school scenes, the torments Stephen is forced to endure at the hands of his former friends are painfully realistic. That the author's parents are both writers (father Stan is a poet) will generate interest in this novel, but its originality and merits stand on their own. Kristine Huntley
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Rocky Mountain News, August 27, 2000
"...an imaginative, gothic tale..." --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Seattle Weekly, August 24, 2000
He's learned...a storyteller's sense of timing. And he capably bring's a gay teen's inner turmoil to life." --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
XY Magazine
"...it has sort of a Blair Witch suspense..." --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Kansas City Star
"Solid debut novel...an absorbing tale." --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Austin Chronicle
"[Rice's] characters speak and act with an ease that proves [him] to be wiser than his years." --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Publisher's Weekly, August 2000
"... an intriguing, complex story, a hard-nosed, lyrical, teenage take on Peyton Place..." --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.