Eulogy

Murray's debut novel is a meditation on pain and solitude. William Oaks has finally begun to distance himself from his toxic relationship with his parents when they die in a car accident. The event pulls him back into the world of his childhood, which was shaped by a smalltown Pentecostal church and his mother's devotion to selling a meal-replacement beverage called Slender Nation. Most of the novel is structured as footnotes to the eulogy that William delivers at his parents' funeral, a series of memories and anecdotes. Tracing the lineage of his pain, from his research about long-forgotten ancestors to his childhood and his adult life as a paper conservator at the Royal Ontario Museum, these chapters reveal a deeply isolated human being whose only trusted companion is the physical pain that he inflicts on himself to subdue his emotional chaos. The novel, like William and his parents, avoids humor and compassion, and is driven by a dynamic between a longing for connection and the disappointment that accompanies the failure to find it. While this creates an interesting emotional parallel, it also leaves the reader feeling detached and numb, like they too didn't quite get what they'd hoped for. Agent: Strothman Agency. (July)