Calling Mr. Lonely Hearts: A Novel

Laura Benedict writes in the manner in which Bryan Ferry sings: there is a light, almost airy touch on the surface of her narrative, one that almost masks the sensuality, decadence and subtle terror of what lies beneath. When you begin reading CALLING MR. LONELY HEARTS, Benedict's latest work, I suggest Ferry's "Slave to Love" on repeat as your background music. Not that the novel needs any accompaniment: it's pitch-perfect on its own, an addictive and haunting wonder. One might think from the title that Benedict has written a chick-lit novel. While it shares some of the elements of that genre --- following bffs from adolescence into adulthood, documenting joy and heartbreak --- it does so only superficially. Instead, this book will scare you, keep you up all night, and set every nerve in your body on edge and on fire. It is as if Benedict set out to complete the job left undone by Stephen King, John Updike, and yes, maybe even Dante Alighieri. There are elements of all three here, yet Benedict's tale remains as unique and original as anything you have read recently. CALLING MR. LONELY HEARTS begins with three friends on the cusp of adolescence: Roxanne is advanced beyond her years, aware of the power of her awakening sexuality; Alice is a needy satellite caught in her orbit; and Del provides an uneasy counterbalance and buffer of relative normality between the two. The girls participate in a ceremony intended to bring to each of them a true and perfect love. Their individual destinies are decided not by this innocent, almost childish ritual (though it has an influence) but rather by an act of seduction involving Father Romero, a young Catholic priest who teaches at a Catholic girls' school and who hides a prior sin under a strong faith but whose passions become put to ill use. Romero's unwilling but ultimately headlong rush into sin leads to a further betrayal and the end of his vocation, a state of affairs for which he is not blameless but rather a victim as much of his own weakness as he is of the girls' guile. Disgraced, Romero leaves behind the school, the priesthood --- and a situation that he will not learn of for decades. Meanwhile, Del, Roxanne and Alice remain in contact as they attain adulthood, though they lead very different lives. Del is married to a widower with a child and is overwhelmed, if happily so, with the responsibilities. Roxanne is a successful artiste and, while eschewing permanent relationships, has never met a husband she couldn't seduce. Alice is on the cusp of a failed marriage to a successful dentist who is about to leave her for a woman who is pregnant with his child. Romero, teaching at a faraway community college, meets Varick, an enigmatic creature who is willing to give Romero the revenge he craves against the friends, in return for the ultimate price: his life. Romero, seduced in the present as he was in the past, readily agrees. Varick gradually insinuates himself into the lives of each of the women in ve

Highly original, and just as much unexpected, /Calling Mr. Lonely Hearts/ gently teases you into reading along, while you are unknowingly being led into the setup for quite the ride. Three childhood girlfriends are all drifting apart in their now middle-aged lives and going through the same old routine - divorce, loneliness, the works. All of their problems, it seems, are being caused, at least in part, by the suave and secretive Varick, and it looks like he knows exactly what to do to achieve his goal. Varick has been sent on a mission of vengeance by a bitter priest, who all three women wronged quite a long time ago. With creative plot lines and quite innovative drama, /Calling Mr. Lonely Hearts/ is an excellent piece of work. Benedict has come up with something new in genre in which too many books read exactly the same, save for names of characters, and she has done so with chilling aptitude.

I am reluctant to reveal this novel's surprises, but suffice it to say they are just icing on the cake that is Calling Mr. Lonely Hearts, a novel well acquainted not just with good and evil, but also with everything deliciously in between, including the good time evil can be, and the evil that attaches to the practice of goodness. Novel by novel, Laura Benedict is proving herself the new master of the supernatural thriller, a genre much in need of a new master. I suspect we'll be seeing Mr. Lonely Hearts at the movies before too long, so my recommendation would be you buy your copy now, and enjoy the pleasure of being first to the big time party.

CALLING MR. LONELY HEARTS by Laura Benedict is a supernatural suspense, a genre that I only touch lightly here at Fantasy Debut. Usually, I like heroic tales of high adventure, which this book is decidedly not. But I loved it anyway. I couldn't put it down. CALLING is a complex tale about three women, Alice, Roxanne and Del. Alice is the ultimate follower--she would do anything that her hero, Roxanne, says. Roxanne relishes this power, and like all power, it corrupts her. Del is Roxanne's supportive best friend. And Roxanne is the only thing that keeps the three of them together. The story starts when they are thirteen-year-old girls. Roxanne cooks up a ritual--a spell--that will bring them a boyfriend. Del thinks they're just playing. Alice knows they're not. Jump ahead about twenty years to a very unpleasant character, a young man named Dillon. Dillon has just had a car accident with a well-dressed man with an unusual name--Verick. It turns out that Dillon's sister is Thad's lover. Who is Thad? Thad is Alice's husband. And Verick has targeted Dillon for a reason. The whole book is like this. All these little connections that don't become obvious until many pages later. It was like trying to trace a spider's web. Not just any spider--a black widow. Which spins a web that looks like nothing more than a tangle of silk. And then we have Romero, who turns out to be a former priest. Who turns out to have been a teacher where young Alice, Roxanne and Del went to school. And we have the sin that drew them all together years ago. And another sin that brings them together once again, years later. One thing interesting about the horror genre is that it is not afraid to work with Christian elements. This novel has many Christian elements, unapologetically presented. It also has elements of Santeria, which is a blend of Christian saint worship and West African religious traditions. Satan is a character in this novel, and he is absolutely chilling. CALLING is about a deal with the devil--and not the sort of deal you might suspect. And it doesn't have the sort of punishments you might expect. Not all of the sinners die--and not all of the good characters live. CALLING is not for the faint of heart. It is not a happy book. I would have preferred that there not be so many deaths at the end, but the author knew when to stop. I expected another death, but he lived. The author may take some heat for underage sex here--underage sex with an adult man--but I think she handled it well. But there is a hero by the end after all-someone I never expected. Bravo for him. It was great. This is the sort of novel that I like to read again in order to find answers that eluded me the first time. It's one for the keeper shelf.

Teenage machinations reach their devilish, cold and sticky fingers into the present in this terrifying melodrama where a shamed priest is forced to exact revenge after a lifetime of betrayal, and where three women must ultimately face the one lie upon which they have built their lives. Bitter, unsentimental, unforgiving, - and at times devastatingly violent - Calling Mr. Lonely Hearts is a portrait of Roxanne, Del and Alice whose deception is their only real talent. As young and vulnerable girls, all three are immediately in thrall to the handsome Cuban, Father Romero when he arrives to teach at their Catholic school, Our Lady of the Hills. But it is Roxanne who is most determined to act out her sexual fantasies with the attractive priest. When the girls suddenly conspire against him, Father Romero is cast out, forced to live on the fringes of society, consumed by the burdens of his sins. Even as he remains angst-riddled over his fall from grace, he finds comfort in the slave religion of Santeria and its dark rituals of revenge. Yet still Romero remains obsessed with Roxanne, the unleashing of all of the closeted passions late one night transforming his existence forever. Meanwhile, the girls grow older, becoming successful members of Cincinnati society, but their apparent affluence and success hides a severe dysfunction, in part brought about by the secrets they've kept hidden along with all of the manipulative games they once played at Our Lady of the Hills. For years Alice has been obsessed with having a child with her dentist husband Thad, but Thad is unhappy and has fallen into an affair with his assistant Amber who also happens to be carrying his child. For her part, Roxanne is now an artist specializing in weird sculptures of birds, living on the fringes of the social page society. Work and art are the only things that mean anything to Roxanne. Lost in the past, Roxanne's dilemma is her rapidly fracturing relationship with Alice and her inability to pull Del back from the brink and the darkness she feels is closing in on her. In the meantime, the poor and dependable Del is always trying just a little too hard as she aches to be the flawless suburban wife and the budding socialite, married to the loving Jock with their perfect little daughter Amber. The decent into madness for all of these characters begins with a sudden suicide. Alice begins to drift into a bizarre self-obsession even as she falls into despair over Thad's relationship with Amber. Thad is slipping away and Alice powerless to do anything about it and she convinced he doesn't love her anymore because of what she couldn't give him. When Amber's no-good brother appears back in town, the drugged-out and tattooed Dillon, it is clear that this group of people will be plagued by unfinished business. It is Dillon's befriending of the cruel Varik, an arrangement based on mutual need, that fuels much of the hatred and vitriol that follows as the narrative accelerates towards an