Magical Realism - 4.5 starsAnother highly entertaining, amazing fairy tale-like story from the wonderful Lily Prior. Among her novels is LaCucina -- I've read every one of her books. She's a huge favorite of mine because of writing like this:Ardor opens with our heroine, Fernanda Ponderosa, sitting on a dock waiting to board a ship with her most treasured possessions:"The great oak chests containing linens and laces blocked the approach to the waterside. ... Cast onto the dock like the jumble of a bad dream was a wooden rocking horse with a mane of real hair, the life-size marble statue of the goddess Aphrodite, a chaise lounge, a spiral staircase, family portraits, a glass tank containing the turtle Olga and her seven coin-size babies, a weathervane, a baptismal font dating from the time of the first Crusades, a selection of hatboxes, a grand piano, the mounted head of a unicorn, a stuffed pygmy hippopotamus in a display cabinet, a harp supported by carved wooden angels, a heavy oak crib, a grandfather clock, a nest of galvanized buckets, an elephant's foot umbrella stand, copper pans, a feather bed, an American-style refrigerator stocked for the journey, tennis rackets, a crystal chandelier, a banana tree, and finally a valise containing gold ingots and precious jewels.This selection was by no means the entire contents of the house, nor indeed the most precious, but ... the only things that she would have rescued in event of a fire." (pages 4 & 5)
Dry uproariously funny story of unrequited love. The writing is tasteful despite the subject (a mule falls for a man). Don't be alarmed! The subject is just one thread amongst many stories of romantic desire and frustration (between humans!). Love between species isn't the only transgression contemplated by the desperate characters.Spoken narrator, Laurence Bouvard, notes: Middle-aged female who can do a wide range of voices. Brisk strong (with the benefit of reverb), clipped delivery. United States dialect, New York?, news="nooz". Confident pronunciation of Italian names and words. Expressive.
