- Paperback: 320 pages
- Publisher: Hyperion - Miramax (Aug 22 2001)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0786886463
- ISBN-13: 978-0786886463
- Product Dimensions: 20.1 x 12.7 x 2 cm
- Shipping Weight: 272 g
- Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (321 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #262,511 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Amazon.com
Take the sensuous, fecund New Orleans setting, add a generous helping of tangled Southern family history, and season liberally with a sensitive teenage boy rejected by his friends and frightened of his own homoerotic impulses and you wouldn't be surprised to discover that the novel containing all of the above was written by someone named Rice. But a few paragraphs into the first page, it's clear that Anne Rice's son's first novel isn't about vampires or witches and does not otherwise read like one of her exceedingly popular books. The only family resemblance is in the setting, the sexual orientation of the lovingly described male characters, and the scent of overripe magnolias.
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.
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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Customer Reviews
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Most helpful customer reviews
3.0 out of 5 stars
Decent Debut with a Good Story,
By David Bell (Los Angeles, CA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: A Density Of Souls (Paperback)
This story is interesting and very well worked out, while the author's english and writing skill leaves something to be desired. The publisher most likely relied on Christopher's last name to sell novels (and was write in coounting on it) but there are minor fixes that needed to be made before the story was published. Christopher has proven that he has a remarkable imagination, as his mother has, and can weave a good story. While the ending may be shocking to some, I believe this is what the author was going for, to shock, make the reader think and begin a discussion.
1.0 out of 5 stars
Mixing up the issues...,
By A Customer
This review is from: A Density Of Souls (Paperback)
I guess what gets me is how people are basing their opinion of Rice's books on his sexual orientation and his good looks. There is definitely better gay fiction out there to be read, guys! (You'll figure that out when you get over your crush.) The actual writing is really shoddy. I admit I couldn't even finish _A Density of Souls_; I felt too much like I was back in high school- Rice is that kid who kept raising his hand to ask completely unrelated questions, exasperating even the teacher. I won't say what I usually think when I read books by very young novelists- that nepotism makes it possible- because I'm sure if Rice had submitted his photo and platform to any agent of bestsellers he could've done it on his own, but his writing would've deserved to be panned, anyway...
4.0 out of 5 stars
Great Debut,
By
This review is from: A Density Of Souls (Paperback)
I became associated with Christopher Rice's work because I'm such a big fan of his mothers work. As for a debut, this novel was excellent. The same gift that his mother has in describing places to where you can smell the flowers and hear the traffic must have been passed down to Mr. Rice. I found the story to be interesting and the characters were well developed. It saddened me to see that four characters who had such a strong bond in their youth would end up playing a part in each others destruction both emotionally and physically. I also liked how Rice gave some of his characters redeeming qualities, Meredith in particular. I bought this novel while visiting a friend in Mandeville and laughed at the irony days later when I was reading about one of the characters driving across the Causeway bridge just as I had done the day I purchased the book. Never before had I started a novel and finished it in less than five days. There were moments I had to force myself to put the novel down (even at 2 in the morning.) The only thing that threw me off with this novel were all of the grammatical errors and typos I noticed. He needs a better editor. And lastly, if there is one thing this novel needs is a sequel. The ending enough shocked me and only left me wanting more.
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