Review by charlottesometimes - Audrey Rose

charlottesometimes 's review for:

Audrey Rose by Frank De Felitta

slow-paced

Two people, a Don Draper nightmare and a hysterical male fantasy figure, have a child. She is perfect, which apparently means physically attractive and thus constantly sexualised. Then some lunatic who has been to India once turns up and starts shouting about reincarnation and saying that she is really his daughter. This somehow takes 462 pages to resolve. And even then there is, somehow, a sequel.

Questions raised by this book:

Why are all the male characters paedophiles / sexual predators?
Why is nobody concerned by this?
Why is the wife keeping it a secret from the husband that she and the daughter are being stalked?
Why does no one care that one of the aforementioned shameless paedophiles is also a public domestic abuser?
Why is the husband keeping it a secret from the wife that he and the daughter are being stalked?
Why if some man with fake sideburns was stalking you would you immediately think “The FBI must be after me?”
Would a middle-class American man in the 70s really change into a red velvet smoking jacket to have dinner with his wife and daughter?
Are this couple aware that they both have serious alcohol problems?
Why do I have to keep hearing about their adventurous sex lives? (“adventurous” is here used to mean “existing at all”)
Did Estée Lauder really have a donation programme replacing playground equipment with “awkward surrealist play forms?”
Was there a required word-count for this book? It would explain the repetitious details of interior decor, meals, clothes, women/girls’ bodies and irrelevant weather conditions.
Who becomes a hermit by refusing to update his biography in ‘Who’s Who’?
Who uses the word ‘garments’ 3 times in a page and a half? Do a re-read with a thesaurus next to you Frank
A big clue to the reincarnation thing is that Girl 2 was born exactly the same time as Audrey Rose died. However in the same breath Original Dad admits that he knows that this isn’t actually how reincarnation works. So…why?
Does Frank know the difference between reincarnation and possession? It sure doesn’t seem like it…
Is it possible for a baby to be born already showing her ‘awesome beauty?’
Does anyone really think that feeling pain when you kneel in church is a sign of apostasy?
Was it really necessary to bring Christ into this? *eyeroll*
“the [Catholic] church has reacted wisely for 2000 years - the only human institution to have withstood” Right, but that isn’t true, is it? Not even close.
Over 1/3 of the way in, why is the most notable occurrence 2 drunk, negligent parents letting their kid fall down the stairs?
How come, despite the above, the mother has totally lost her shit and commenced to running about hysterically screaming about the Holy Virgin, and letting a stalker strip her unconscious child and do as he pleases with the body…?
And now she’s letting said stalker rub her legs with baby oil. What is happening?
Half way through. Whilst I am glad than anything at all is happening, is the rest of the book really going to be a man on trial, defending himself from charges of kidnapping by arguing that the victim is actually his reincarnated daughter? What court would allow that?
Am I really going to have to read all the events (such as they are) of the book re-hashed as courtroom speeches, and then again as news reports? Please, I can’t bear it…
Would anyone really call a restaurant the Clam Box?
“Janice…hungrily bent to conclude her obeisant and purifying ritual” Guess what Janice is doing? Yes, it is indeed a sex act, being described in the most excruciating manner possible. Come on, Frank. For fuck’s sake. Am I not suffering enough? And TBH, isn’t poor Janice?
What kind of court lets the defendant pass secret notes to the alleged victims mid-trial?
Why does Frank think that all 10-year-olds talk about is which of their friends has one boob bigger than the other, and who is menstruating?
Why is so much of the court case just a circus of racist stereotypes and random nonsense?
Why is the little girl naked again Frank? And why are you talking about her budding breasts for what isn’t even the first time? I’m glad you’re almost certainly dead, so I don’t have to worry about alerting the authorities.
Is the best way to exchange secret documents with a detective for you both to sit in adjoining toilet stalls with your pants around your ankles “for the sake of appearances?”
Is there any way to remove the following phrase from my memory: “Is a pig’s pussy pork?”
Is it reasonable to be well over 3/4 of the way through writing the book and just decide to completely change how the whole reincarnation/possession thing works, just because nothing was happening?
Why is Audrey Rose the Little Dead Girl evil now?
Why do I care about the outcome of the court case? It seems that it’s going to be the denouement (along with the last minute evil thing(?)) but…it’s just to decide if Original Dad is gonna be done for kidnapping or not. He’s not gonna get the girl back. Nothing is gonna change. There is no actual jeopardy. I guess that’s why Audrey Rose the LDG had to go evil- otherwise what point is there reading to the end?
Why, so close to the end, would you make me read more of Original Dad’s diaries? They’re nothing but the insanely dull ramblings of a White Tourist. Please, stop.
“INFINITY. INDIA. INSIDE. All these words begin with IN. INCARNATION.” But - Not in any of the many, many Indian languages as far as I know. And certainly not as far as you know. Do you really think that works as some kind of revelation, Frank?
Oh. My. God. Have the Scientologists just been introduced as enlightened good guys? Could this book have aged any worse?
If Chapter 23 is just going to be a witness statement summarising the entire book so far, why did I read Chapters 1-22?
Is a child having a cold which then clears up a clear sign of them being possessed? I would say not.
Why is the mother being allowed to just chat on incessantly on the stand, telling loads of irrelevant nonsense stories and generally messing up everyone’s case? She’s basically just gossiping now, and at length.
Are they seriously going to hypnotise a child and introduce it into court as evidence? Even though they know she has already heard enough info about LDG to fake being her? Why? Who would agree to that? Where are the CPS, or whatever they have in the USA?
Sorry, did the child just die of hypnosis? In court? And they’re still continuing the case? What the fuck, Frank? Is this a joke?
And why was the Epilogue the lawyer for the prosecution visiting his parents’ grave? Who cares? Certainly not me.

Well, this might be the worst thing I’ve ever read. In terms of reincarnation or suchlike, nothing happened to the little girl that couldn’t be explained by trauma due to being raised by two dipsomaniacs in an environment crawling with sexual predators. The people are all vile idiots, the plot is thin nonsense, and it is at least three times as long as necessary. It’s riddled with smug misogyny and orientalist. And worst of all, it’s boring. Truly a cardinal sin for a trash book.

Content Warnings