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Density of Souls, A
by Christopher Rice
| List Price: |
$29.95 |
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Audio Cassette
Format: Bargain Price
A gripping and hauntingly atmospheric debut novel from Anne Rice's son In the brooding milieu of New Orleans, four friends are about to recognise the fragile boundaries between loyalty and betrayal. Once inseparable. Meredith, Brandon, Stephen and Greg enter high school only to learn that their friendship cannot withstand the envy and rage of adolescence. Their individual struggles are fuelled by the generations of family feuds and furtive passions hoarded within their opulent Garden District homes and soon, two violent deaths disrupt the core of this closeted society. Five years later, the former friends are drawn back together as new facts about their mutual history are revealed and what was once held to be a tragic accident is discovered to be murder. As the true story emerges, long-kept secrets begin to unravel and the casual cruelties of high school develop into acts of violence that threaten to destroy an entire community. A Density of Souls marks a stunning debut and its series of shocking twists will leave you reeling. Bold, compelling and haunting, this is American gothic in a new and intriguing guise.
Take the sensuous, fecund New Orleans setting, add a generous helping of tangled Southern family history, and season liberally with a sensitive teenage boy rejected by his friends and frightened of his own homoerotic impulses and you wouldn't be surprised to discover that the novel containing all of the above was written by someone named Rice. But a few paragraphs into the first page, it's clear that Anne Rice's son's first novel isn't about vampires or witches and does not otherwise read like one of her exceedingly popular books. The only family resemblance is in the setting, the sexual orientation of the lovingly described male characters, and the scent of overripe magnolias. There's murder, suicide, and madness at the heart of this rather clumsy coming-of-age story, which focuses on the youthful friendship of Stephen Conlin, Meredith Ducote, Greg Darby, and Brandon Charbonnet. This friendship is destroyed by a sexual incident that takes place just before the foursome enters Cannon, an exclusive prep school. There, Stephen is ostracized by his former friends, now the most popular kids on campus, who'd just as soon forget their own complicity in the event. Envy, passion, and rage drive the narrative, but the emotions are as juvenile as the characters, and the long passages depicting the rituals and cruelties of high school, from pep rallies to football games, slow down the pace without really illuminating character or motivation. The novel reads like a roman à clef. Rice might have been wiser to tell someone else's story rather than his own. --Jane Adams
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| Creative, Interesting, and Soulful |
| Customer Rating: 5 out of 5 |
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This book was a great coming of age story regarding adolescents and young adults at the turn of the twenty-first century New Orleans. This book kept my interest because it was unpredictable and the character development was realistic and mesmerizing. If you are looking for a mystery that explores the trials and tribulations of nearly every character in the book, then you have come to the right place indeed!
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| Dull, boring, disappointing |
| Customer Rating: 1 out of 5 |
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I was expecting Christopher to be a richly talented writer, considering who his parents are, but this novel was horrible. First, the characters, I did not feel anything for them, they were so dull and the only thing he seemed to focus on was the gay factor. There is more to a person than their sexual preferences, far more and I felt that outside of that fact, these characters were flat and lifeless. This novel disappointed me so greatly, I will not read another C.Rice novel. There seems to be a struggle between his personal desire to write about his own lifestyle and his ability to tell a good story. I absolutely don't mind gay men as leading characters, but give me a story! Tell me something more about them other than the obvious and make me feel something for what you put them through, I felt nothing, because this novel is thin, too thin and I just didn't care about these people; one dimensional in scope and very sloppy pacing make this book one to forget. If you are buying solely because you like Anne, don't bother.
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| Great. |
| Customer Rating: 5 out of 5 |
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I read this book about 4 years ago, and I reread it at least 3 times a year. Its at the top of my book list. A very good read.
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| Stunning debut |
| Customer Rating: 4 out of 5 |
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I'm not sure how you would describe Rice's potential audience, but I must be one of them! I could take all the positive comments written about this book, and repeat them. I won't. I'll just nod my head. Set in New Orleans - for all those poor residents of New Orleans after Katrina, this is a spooky premonition, with the climax of the book being an equally disastrous storm. I usually take a while to read books, as I read at the speed of talking. However, I read this in one go. (Cliche I know, but I've never done this before or since). If a storm hit my place, I would take this book with me.
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| Boring and completely unsatisfying, not what I'd expect from anyone in the Rice family... |
| Customer Rating: 1 out of 5 |
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It's not always a bad thing to delve into one's own life experiences when developing a novel for the public. Some of life's greatest lessons can be learned from childhood experiences, but in the case of author Christopher Rice this is not the case. Sure, `A Density of Souls' isn't a word for word accounting of this kids high-school days BUT it's apparent that he was at the short end of quite a few cruel pranks and or jokes growing up. The books main character is probably not too far off from Christopher at all, maybe even only in name. The problem I have with this novel is that it promises a lot but delivers very little and ultimately dissolves into a gigantic waste of time and talent. Yes, I said talent because I have had the pleasure of reading Christopher's sophomore novel `The Snow Garden' and was blown away by his creative and artistic story telling capabilities. Sadly, if I had not read that novel FIRST I would have never given it a second thought after reading this drivel.
So, why, you may ask, do I loathe this novel so much? Well, for starters it has a tendency to drag out for long stretches of pointless banter, siphoning off onto small side plots that really have nothing to do with the initial story or end result and appear to be the authors attempt at expanding the lifeless characters he's created, but he fails miserably. He in a few areas begins to offer small glimmers of hope that maybe, just maybe this story is actually going somewhere impressive but he never really follows through with anything. The beginning of the novel hints towards a dark secret that when revealed is nothing more than boys at play and has no real shock value what so ever. The end, while at times impressive, turns out chaotic and overly dramatic and becomes nothing more than a cry for help from the homosexual community for acceptance.
The story, as one reviewer mentioned, is clumsy. His story revolves around four childhood friends whose friendship is turned upside down when one of them comes out as homosexual. That odd one out was Stephen Conlin. Worse yet, his former friends Greg Darby and Brandon Charbonnet were not only popular but jocks, which, you know, stereotypically puts them in ultimate defiance to Stephen's newfound lifestyle. The fourth member of this group is Meredith Ducote who doesn't seem to know how to feel. She doesn't necessarily agree with the way Stephen is treated but it's not like she really does anything about it. Christopher paints his male bullies as the worst of the worst, giving them no human emotion but that of hatred and cruelty and so they come off one dimensional and unrealistic, until the very end where one of the two can honestly be sympathized with as frustrated and confused.
In the end I have to say that this was not worth the time I spent muddling through it. It was one of the biggest disappointments in literature for me recently because, as I mentioned, I really enjoyed `The Snow Garden' and was highly anticipating relishing in this debut. Sadly, that was not the case and I'm left cold and distant and unsure if I'll even attempt to read Christopher's third novel `Light Before Day' (which I've read was the worst of the three so I'm strongly leaning towards passing it up). I just wish that this novel could have really taken me somewhere instead of teasing and then dropping the ball. Christopher is not without talent but his debut novel is without heart, soul and purpose and I highly recommend that you avoid and start with his fantastic sophomore novel because that is the beginnings of a great writer. I will say, that lonely star is for his descriptive writing which, in it of itself, makes at least the setting come alive. New Orleans has never been so engrossing.
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