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Sam Savage's second novel more than lives up to expectations.
Once again, the amusing Mr. Savage engages us with his sharp wit in a plot about a literary enterprise seeing its final days. In his first novel, Firmin, the enterprise is a Boston bookstore. In his new novel, The Cry of the Sloth, it's a Midwestern literary magazine called Soap.
The narrator is Soap Editor Andy Whittaker. He also manages a few rental properties inhabited by combative, non-paying tenants.
The time is pre-email 1970s with a few mentions of Nixon in The White House. Andy writes hilarious letters of advice, want and ridicule to Soap's contributors, his ex-wife, friends, local arts organizations and those difficult tenants.
These missives create the tart, animated narrative that tells the story of Andy's daily struggle to manage his life and keep afloat.
Here's an example of what he deals with -- a short letter to some tenants:
Dear Bob, Eric, and Juan:
I have received another complaint about the noise. You will have to turn it down after 10 or find another place. Wear clothes when you go to the basement with your laundry. Think of the people in the other apartments, who are not as young as you are, have to get up and go to work, and are religious to boot.
None of that is their fault.
Sincerely,
Andrew Whittaker
The Whittaker Company
Responses to the letters aren't included, and we don't need them. Andy's self-pitying and smartly-quipped effusions are enough to illustrate Mr. Savage's clever take on irresponsible people let alone self-aggrandizing writers, snobbish arts organizations and the scrabbling life of aspiring writers.
Here's a typical letter Andy writes to his Soap contributors. This one is a regular:
Dear Dahlberg:
First you accuse me of rejecting your work out of anti-Canadian prejudice, and now you tell me that thanks to being published in Soap you were finally able to get laid. What do you expect me to do with this information?
Andy
Hope for salvation lies in a Soap festival of literature and the arts. Andy attempts to lure authors by telling them it will be big.
"'How big?" you ask, as well you should," he writes to Mr. Mailer, whom we can safely assume is Norman Mailer. "Let me drop this small hint in lieu of an answer," Andy tells Mr. Mailer. "There will be elephants."
Among the letters, we also get excerpts from Andy's novel-in-progress. They're not as interesting as the letters, largely due to a lack of focus. They do, however, provide another literary venue to mock – this time, Mr. Savage takes aim at persistent but untalented writers desperate to explain or vindicate their lives in over-wrought prose.
The more Andy faces financial ruin, the more he uses his wit and mockery to beg, inform and deceive the people in his life. And so his letters build upon one another to create a delightfully entertaining story that showcases a shrewd and spirited personality.
The Cry of the Sloth by Sam Savage is published by Coffee House Press. I'm Kassie Rose.
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