The Gargoyle | Andrew Davidson

The Gargoyle | Andrew Davidson | Anxiously Awaiting MORE from Andrew Davidson

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The Gargoyle

	The Gargoyle Andrew Davidson Doubleday, 2008 - 480 pages average customer review:based on 133 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Loved it...

In all honesty, I had no intention of reading this book. While I was aware of the hype surrounding its release, it just didn't look that interesting to me. Then a friend of mine, who ordered this book from Amazon, recommended that I read it. So okay, I decided to give it a try, but didn't hold out much hope.

I couldn't have been more wrong in my initial assessment. I absolutely loved this book. I found it to be an amazingly written love story. Normally, I'm not fond of authors who try to impress their readers with how smart they are by incorporating their intelligence into their writing, but here, author Andrew Davidson uses his research and knowledge to tell this intricate story of love and redemption in such a way that I was engrossed in the story and never felt I was being "talked down to."

While some others did not find the narrator a likable character, I found him to be quite likable and sympathetic, yet he is a flawed person (and I don't mean physically), but because of his accident, becomes a better human being. One thing that did perplex me, and perhaps some other reviewers can explain this, but the un-named narrator always refers to Marianne as Marianne Engel. I'm sure that there is some significance to this, but it escapes me what that is.

I can see how others might not like this book since it is unusual, but if you're like me and not remotely interested in reading this book, I suggest you do. I think you will be pleasantly surprised.

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Anxiously Awaiting MORE from Andrew Davidson

This book is one of those that has many captivating, horrifying and enthralling moments that suck you in, all the while leaving you completely incapable of describing why you can't put it down.

In this book you will find detailed information about the care and keeping of horrific burn victims in the 21st century, the inner workings of a 14th century scriptorium and the lives of German mystics in that period, the art of glassblowing in ancient Japan, the earmarks of schizophrenia vs. manic depression, the life and love of a homosexual viking, the art of giving hearts to gargoyles carved of stone, and a love that spans 700 years---all wrapped in an early copy of Dante's "Inferno."

This is one of those contemporary novels, like "Shadow of the Wind" or "Time Traveler's Wife," where the reader is left stunned by the originality of the author and bereft when the story is done. I am not quite ready to let go of Marianne Engel and her wonderful stories. I pray that the wait for Andrew Davidson's next jewel isn't as long as we've been waiting for more from Audrey Neffenberger.

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Beautiful, haunting, difficult to describe

For weeks, the subject matter of this book put me off. I knew the main character suffered severe burns in a horrible car crash, and I was afraid this book would be depressing, maybe even frightening. It languished on my To Be Read pile until, feeling the pressure of a review deadline, I finally picked it up a few days ago.

It's not depressing. In fact, The Gargoyle is a story of redemption. But first things first: the initial part of the story does contain vivid detail about the car accident, the narrator's burns, and the treatment he received in the burn ward during his subsequent hospitalization. All of this creates a certain mood, a tone, a levity that probably wouldn't exist without the gory details. So yeah, it's gruesome, but necessarily so.

Davidson's incredible character development quickly overshadows all of this. The main character ... we never even know his name, yet we come to know him intimately. Over the course of the story, he goes from being a vain, selfish, drug-addicted porn star to a loving, caring human being who is capable of seeing his life as better after the accident than before, despite the fact that his body is permanently scarred and disfigured. If this sounds like a bunch of soppy sentamentalism, fear not. The narrator is also hilariously cynical, clever, and sarcastic. I never thought I would laugh while reading this book, but in fact, I did.

The professionals who assisted the narrator in his recovery grew on me as they did on him. He started off his hospital stay determined to hate his doctor, physical therapist and the hospital psychologist. But in the end, all three became his friends, and the friendships reached beyond the hospital walls.

Marianne Engel, the woman with whom the narrator eventually falls in love, was an enigma throughout the story. I spent the entire book trying to decide if she was merely a schizophrenic who refused to take her meds or truly, as she claimed, a medieval German who had known the narrator seven hundred years ago. Her stories about their lives together all those years ago, as well as the love stories of other ancient couples whom she claimed to have known sucked me in, even though each was only a chapter long.

It's not always easy to read a book that shifts constantly between past and present, between fantasy (or in this case, what might be fantasy, although it might be truth) and reality. In this case, it worked. I found the medieval portions of the story just as absorbing as the present, if not more so. The only section that almost lost my interest and that I wasn't particularly fond of was the detailed account of the narrator's dream about descending into Hell as he experienced withdrawal from morphine.

The Gargoyle deserves the accolades it has been receiving. It is not an easy book to read because of the graphic nature of certain subject matters, but somehow that fades into the background and what stands out, what is overpowering about this story is its redemptive nature and, most of all, its unforgettable characters.

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Powerful, engaging, thought provoking

Wow! This one comes at you with guns a-blazing. The first few chapters are incredibly graphic, although not entirely medically accurate, as the narrator sustains and is treated for massive burns. One must suspect that Mr. Davidson was writing for the YUCK factor and that his detailed accounts of pain and anguish will sell a good many copies of the book.

But to cast Gargoyle as merely a gut-wrencher of the physical sort is to sell it far short. It is equally disturbing from a psychosocial perspective. Those who focus solely on the physical trauma to the narrator and the emotional disorder of Marianne--his cohort, tormentor, savior, partner--miss what I consider to be the real nugget of value in this novel. It invites the reader to contemplate a world of moral emptiness and the effect such a vacuum has on society and on individuals. And it does so without resort to ponderous discussions of philosophy, theology, and psychotherapy.

Davidson provides no happy ending and no easy answers. He leaves the thoughtful reader disturbed by the philosophical questions he raises much more than by the gore.

The style is similar to Anne Rice's writing and those who enjoy her work will find this comfortable reading, at least stylistically.

One star off for gratuitously noxious content. Otherwise, highly recommnded.

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Some clunky writing mostly overcome by sheer force of imagination. 3.5 stars

THE GARGOYLE is a true mix of headlong, imaginative, almost fevered narrative drive with a clumsy writing style. It is Andrew Davidson's first published novel, and I'm not too surprised to hear that.

In very simple terms, the book is told to us by a narrator who goes unnamed (for no particularly good reason). This narrator is a porn-star and porn-producer who is also (big surprise) a cocaine addict. In the first scene, he's involved in a horrible car wreck and catches on fire. By sheer luck, the first is extinguished just moments before his life would have been, and he ends up in the hospital as a horribly injured, scarred, disfigured "monster." He works on his recovery only so that he'll be physically able to commit suicide upon his release. He's nasty to his doctor, nurses, physical therapist and psychologist. In fact, he's a completely unsympathetic character...and this is even taking into account the fact that his whole world has been painfully shattered. We come to understand that he pretty much hated himself and all of humanity.

One day, an alluring and vaguely unhinged woman named Marianne Engel comes to his room and announces to him that he is her lost love, from 700 years ago. That in that medieval times, she was a nun and he a mercenary. They fell in love and enjoyed great happiness and endured great hardship. Now they have been reunited.

Naturally, our narrator is skeptical at best of this woman who has actually spent a little time in an institution. She is also a sculptress who creates very detailed (and very expensive) life sized gargoyles. And during her visits, she remains infinitely patient with him and also tells him compelling stories of their past life and also tales of obsessive, enduring love that she has picked up over the years. Our narrator begins to thaw, and eventually agrees to move in with Marianne.

The best parts of the book are the intricate and evocative stories Marianne tells. Whether she's telling the legend of the first gargoyle or regaling us with a story of the powerful love between a couple during the height of the Black Plague...these passages are tightly written, full of carefully researched detail and also romantic in an old-fashioned, satisfying way.

As you might guess, the book makes us wonder if Marianne is a nut, or if her story could possibly be real. Has she really been around for 700 years, waiting for her one true love to return? If so, how has this happened? Will our narrator respond? Will Marianne simply slip deeper and deeper into her delusion?

Unfortunately, much of the writing set in "contemporary" times feels unconvincing or clumsy. For example, Davison frequently spends a great deal of time listing the elaborate meals Marianne prepares. By a great deal of time, I mean nearly a full page simply listing the dishes she is serving. Once might be okay...but there were four occasions when this space-wasting device was used. If there was a good dramatic point to illustrate or an affair of the heart to illuminate, I missed it. Also, some descriptive passages are so crudely imagined that I found myself jolted from the story. My "favorite" came near the end, when an evil spirit is described leaving a body. A foul word is used, and it so jarring, crude and worst of all, simplistic...that for a moment I was completely thrown off my rhythm. This happens from time to time...Davidson has written a porn-star main character but the sexual/sensual descriptions given are a strange mix of over-the-top crude and naïve. At one point, Marianne is eating a piece of pizza in the nude and the narrator describes a string of cheese clinging to her breast. I believe it's meant to be alluring...but it just invoked a laugh from me.

(To Davidson's credit, he clearly researched quite carefully the subject of severe burning and the recovery process. These passages are written in a clear-eyed, unemotional straightforward manner that gives them great impact.)

Another problem is that the book assumes a knowledge of and interest in Dante's INFERNO. If you, like me, are among the 99.5% of the population who have not read the book, you'll find yourself annoyed at the constant references to it...including one LONG sequence which takes a major character through their own visit to Dante's world.

However, I mentioned early on that this book was imaginative and fevered. It is. It's as though Davidson had this great idea for a story come to him, and wrote it down in a long, drunken session in front of the computer. I picture friends and family coming to him and saying "Andrew...take a break. You've been sitting here for a week with no food or sleep." Davidson would have responded with "leave me alone. I've got to get this down!" Although not a lot of "stuff" happens in the story, it nonetheless hurtles along at a fast pace. So, even when the writing was clumsy or in need of an editor, the overall energy of the book seldom left me bored (except for the aforementioned descriptions of meals). I enjoyed myself pretty well for 90% of the novel.

The final sections of the book fail to tie everything together convincingly. While it wasn't completely disappointing, it also lacked true emotional impact for me. I hesitate to explain further for fear of spoiling the book...but let's just say that the nature of the narrator was not explained to my satisfaction.

Overall, I give Andrew Davidson's debut novel 3.5 stars.

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