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HOLY MOLY
by Ben Rehder
St Martin's Minotaur, May 2008
352 pages
$24.95
ISBN: 0312357540


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

HOLY MOLY wasn't at all what I expected from the book description. It was so very much better.

The story is told from about a dozen different points of view, and some of them are musing on their past as well as their present lives. Both nonlinear storytelling and many juggling perspectives are usually my cue to quietly dump a book by page 10, but in this case I, and any other reader, will have no trouble keeping up because all those different eyes are facets focussed on the same thing, like a story read through a kaleidoscope. And like a kaleidoscope, it is amusing enough to make anyone smile.

What every character is concerned with is the death of Hollis Farley, backhoe operator. In life, the kindest thing that could be said about him was what his own sister thought: "he had half the sense of a cigar-store Indian, bless his heart." But then he died while breaking ground for a new megachurch – an accidental death that suddenly seemed less accidental when it was discovered that he was flashing a lot of money around just a few days before he was crushed to death by his own machine. The suspicions were proven correct when the police found that he'd been shot with a crossbow.

What could make anyone kill a good old boy? Through the many eyes of friends, the church's preacher, Pastor Pete's right-hand man, Pastor Pete's wife, law enforcement officers, collectors, and scientists, we discover that Hollis had dug up an extremely rare fossil on church land and was trying to sell it off to the highest bidder. From that moment on, HOLY MOLY is pure caper as everyone tries to figure out who has the fossil and just how much money it might bring. Some want to study it, some want to own it, most want to sell it, and there is some suspicion that Pastor Pete will simply destroy it as a threat to his faith in the literal interpretation of Biblical scripture.

The writing is clever and fun, full of Texas colloquialisms, odd-ball characters like the collector who can only have sex while pretending to be a dinosaur, and just plain funny bits like "He was twenty-eight years old when he finally landed the kind of cushy job he'd always dreamed of: security specialist at a gentleman's club. Also known as a bouncer at a titty bar." If you like Southern humor, satire, madcap capers, or just plain silly fun, give HOLY MOLY a try. It's well worth it.

Reviewed by Linnea Dodson, May 2008

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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


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