May 13, 2011 ARCHIVES | Entertainment | COLUMNS Amy Stolls
Harper
ISBN 978-0061851896
476 pages
$14.99
Reviewed by Sarah Pekkanen
Bess Gray doesn't exactly get the proposal of her dreams: While she's answering the call of nature, her boyfriend shouts out a call of his own through the bathroom door: "Marry me!" It's hard to imagine things could get worse, until Rory McMillan, Bess' gregarious Irish fiance, reveals that in addition to bad timing he also has eight ex-wives.
"The Ninth Wife," by Washington (D.C.) resident Amy Stolls, is a witty, satisfying novel with a clever structure. In alternating chapters, Beth describes their romance while Rory explains the back story behind each of his previous relationships. Just before their narratives collide, Rory tells Bess, "We should talk," and Bess fears what's coming: "Every person who has ever been dumped knows those words, like the poised palms right before they push you off the cliff."
When Rory reveals the truth, Bess flees -- but not in the way that many women would. She puts his proposal on hold and sets out on a cross-country drive, ostensibly to move her grandparents to an assisted living center in Arizona, but with the stealth side mission of tracking down and interviewing Rory's ex-wives.
Inviting himself along for the ride is Bess' friend Cricket, who is mourning the loss of his own partner. Sassy gay friends regularly pop up in women's fiction these days, but Cricket is a complex, fleshed-out character who defies such literary stereotypes, while still nabbing some of the best lines in the book. When a boy points at Cricket's ample belly and asks, "What do you have in there?" he shoots back, "Small children. I ate two this morning with a side of bacon."
As Bess learns some disturbing secrets about her long-married grandparents and interviews Rory's previous lovers, she wonders if he's really worth the gamble. As Bess puts it, "Love continually unleashes new questions that turn it inside out and make it stronger or weaker or just plain tiresome."
There's something so sweetly endearing about both Bess and Rory that readers will pull for them, knowing the odds may be against them -- even against marriage itself -- but hoping that this time, true love will triumph. And also that Rory will improve his delivery of important questions.
Sarah Pekkanen is the author of "Skipping a Beat" and "The Opposite of Me."
Copyright 2011 Washington Post Writers Group
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