Heartbreaker
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3.1 • 7 Ratings
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- $13.99
Publisher Description
A poignant new novel that combines humour and heartache, from the brilliant mind of Governor General’s Award finalist Claudia Dey
Seventeen years after falling from a stolen car into a remote northern town, Billie Jean Fontaine is still an outsider. She may follow the stifling rules of this odd place, but no one will forget that she came from elsewhere. When Billie Jean vanishes one cold October night in her bare feet and track suit with only her truck keys, those closest to her begin a frantic search. Her daughter, Pony, a girl struggling against being a teen in the middle of nowhere; her killer dog to whom she cannot tell a lie; her husband, The Heavy, a man haunted by his past; and the charismatic Supernatural, a teenage boy longing only to be average. Each holding a different piece of the puzzle, they must come together to understand the darkest secrets of their beloved, and lay bare the mysteries of the human heart.
With her luminous prose, wry humour and dead-on cultural observations, Claudia Dey has created a storytelling tour de force about what it means to love, no matter the consequences.
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
In an isolated, cultish northern community where jerrycans of gas are prized and funerals must wait for the thaw, time itself seems to have frozen. Stunt author Claudia Dey introduces us to Pony Darlene Fontaine, whose desire to escape this strange enclave is matched by her longing to find her vanished mom and her infatuation with a sweet, mysterious boy called Supernatural. With its multiple viewpoints, Heartbreaker balances Pony’s clear-eyed teenage perspective with a poetic surrealism. The novel had us under a magic spell.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Dey (Stunt) brings readers into the unique world of "the territory," a secluded town in the upper reaches of North America founded by a charismatic cult leader. The 391 residents live in an infinitely extended 1985, listening to Billy Joel and watching Dallas reruns in complete seclusion from the outside world. After Pony Darlene Fontaine's mother leaves her and her father (known as "The Heavy"), Pony re-examines the rituals and conditions of her exile, while navigating her own girlhood. Subsequent chapters shift the perspective to the Fontaines' dog, and then Pony's crush, the boy known as Supernatural, as they join in the search for the vanished Billie Jean Fontaine. But it's not the plot, the characters, or even the premise that makes this novel so extraordinary it's the voice, which is so utterly unusual and authentic as to seem like it's really coming from a world of total isolation, turning up glittering aphorisms such as "Complaint is a form of self-degradation. Hardship is a matter of perception." And yet, Pony's inner self is as complex and vivid as any teenage girl's; at one point she thinks, "I am the softest thing going." Dey strips away the trappings of modernity to show what humans truly are at base, while eschewing the usual cult narrative. The result is a whole-cloth, word-for-word triumph of imagination.
Customer Reviews
Did not like this book at all
Very predictable, depressing and boring.
Could barely finish reading it.