Spadework [Mass Market Paperback]

In Spadework, Timothy Findley marries his passions for playwriting and prose in a novel about theatre people in a theatre town whose reliance on dialogue and visual clues make it read almost like a play. Jane Kincaid is a wealthy southern belle who abandons her life as a daughter of privilege in Louisiana in order to become a set designer. She moves to Stratford, Ontario, home of the Stratford Festival, with her son Will and husband Griffin, a stage actor on the cusp of fame. When the gardener accidentally severs their phone line with his spade, things begin to go awry in unexpected ways. A missed call to his director, Jonathan, leads ambitious and self-absorbed Griffin to become Jonathan's lover in order to win back his favour and some choice parts in next season's productions. A beautiful phone repairman comes to fix the line, and Jane falls in love with him.

Some aspects of the narrative seem unconvincing or irrelevant, such as a murderer on the loose whose existence only peripherally contributes to the mood and plot. A compelling tale that successfully draws the reader into the theatre world in general, and into idyllic Stratford in particular, Spadework lacks the substance and depth of character of Findley's other works, including Not Wanted on the Voyage and, more recently, Pilgrim. --Leah Eichler --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Bestselling Canadian writer Findley, whose stylish and complexly plotted novels have acquired an appreciative audience, here departs from his usual dark scenarios to produce an erotically powered narrative in which all's well that ends well. The setting is the town of Stratford, Ontario, home of the Shakespeare Festival. Findley (Pilgrim) knows this world well, and he conveys it with atmospheric detail. The inadequacy of mere ambition, even when one has talent, is the lesson learned by rising actor Griffin Kincaid, when he realizes that luck and fate can also play havoc with dreams of theatrical stardom. After Kincaid refuses a sexual proposition by his manipulative homosexual director, Jonathan Crawford, he is denied the roles he'd been promised. Griffin's wife, Jane, a Louisiana set designer for the theater, is bitter because Griffin refuses to let her use her substantial inherited income to buy a home in which to raise their seven-year-old son. When, by chance, her gardener cuts a buried phone line, dramatic events ensue. The telephone repairman is a young Polish immigrant, inarticulate but strangely beautiful, and Jane is aroused. Attracted to the repairman yet worried by Griffin's inattention, Jane suspects that her husband is having an affair with an actress. Then she realizes he has capitulated to Jonathan's demands. Despite being a sexual bully, Jonathan is acutely sensitive to Shakespeare, and his insights are enlightening. A hopeful ending provides uplift, but does not, unfortunately, compensate for shopworn characterization and the overdone Tennessee Williams atmosphere. For Findley, this is a curiously slapdash performance.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

--This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

In this tenth novel, best-selling Canadian author Findley (Pilgrim) depicts the disintegration of a family against the backdrop of the Stratford, Ontario, Shakespeare Festival. Griffin and Jane Kincaid live with their son, Will, in idyllic Stratford. Griffin, a repertory theater actor, discovers that his future success may depend on his response to homosexual overtures by the theater's director. Griffin is ambitious, but the security afforded by his wife's large inheritance suggests that something other than professional hunger motivates his fall onto the casting couch. Jane's simultaneous infatuation with Milos, the handsome Canada Bell repairman who arrives to mend a broken phone line, comes when she is most vulnerable. Yet this response rings false from a woman supposedly struggling to keep her marriage intact. Subtle character connections are interesting, but while diverting, subplots concerning the serial murders of women in neighboring towns and the domestic strife rampant in the family life of minor characters ultimately seem extraneous. For larger collections. Margee Smith, Grace A. Dow Memorial Lib., Midland, MI

Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

--This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Canadian Findley, many of whose novels have been runaway best-sellers in his home country, moves from his noirish preoccupations to write what looks at first blush like a bright theatrical mystery set at the Shakespeare Festival in Stratford, Ontario. Yet Findley doesn't completely succumb to the conventions of the traditional off-stage murder mystery. He is clearly after bigger fish in this multileveled mix of genre novel, character study, and something that looks a lot like magic realism. Highly dreamlike, bizarre occurrences twist his characters' lives into ever more fantastic shapes. A broken phone connection tears apart the life of a young married couple, the Kincaids, who seem to have everything going for them: the husband, Griffin, is coming into his own as a Shakespearean actor; the wife, Jane, is completely caught up in marriage and set design. The disconnection, in true Shakespearean fashion, leads to missed meetings and revealed alibis that in turn lead to discoveries of betrayal, jealousy, and murder. At times, the novel's escapes into the fantastic gum up the plot, but, overall, this is highly entertaining stagecraft. Connie Fletcher
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

“Findley will entertain you.” (Washington Post Book World )

“Findley spins an engrossing tale” (Suzanne Ferriss, Florida Sun-Sentinel )

“Highly entertaining” (Robert Allen Papinchak, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel ) --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

On a summer evening a gardener's spade slices a telephone cable into distant silence. The resulting disconnection is devastating. With the failure of one call to reach the house, an ambitious young actor becomes the victim of sexual blackmail. The blocking of a second call leads to murder. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Timothy Findley was one of Canada’s most compelling and best loved writers, from the publication of his first novel in 1967 until his death in June 2002. His acclaimed novels include Spadework, Pilgrim, The Piano Man’s Daughter, Headhunter, Not Wanted on the Voyage, Famous Last Words and The Wars. Findley was a two-time winner of the Governor General’s Award: The Wars won the 1977 award for fiction; Elizabeth Rex, a play, won the 2000 award for drama. The recipient of many accolades for his fiction, non-fiction and drama, including the Chalmers Award and the Edgar Award, Findley was made an Officer of the Order of Canada, and a Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in France. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.