Calling Out

I picked up this book at the airport and I read the whole thing on the plane! The author captures perfectly what it is like to live in Utah and the dynamic between the Mormon church and what goes on behind the scenes at an escort service. I couldn't help but think of the show "Big Love" a few times. Having lived in Utah myself, these characters and descriptions were so real: the Moab river-guide friend, his druggie girlfriend, the smiling LDS families on the streets, the Salt Lake City places. I also found the main character, Jane, very believable. Although most people probably can't fathom being an escort, you start cheering on for her to go for it and then when it gets to be too much, you hope she'll pull away. Great book!

I devoured this book in just a few days and loved it! The author's engaging writing style, strong character development and unique storyline made this book stand out for me. It was hard to put down, and when I did, I found myself eager to return to the story. I would recommend it to anyone looking for an entertaining story from a fresh new voice.

Wow. What a lovely first novel. Jane, Calling Out's heroine, travels west after a bad break up and unfulfilling advertising job come to an end in New York City. She finds herself answering phones at an escort agency in Salt Lake City, land of the Mormons. Its a slippery slope and not long before she finds herself going out on "dates". Lost and sympathetic, Jane's empathy for her clients makes her wholly relatable. Ultimately, she hits bottom when the escorting spirals out of control. Only then does she come to realize who she really is. Meadows spare and resonant prose evoke Didion's Play it as it lays. I can't wait for the next book by this promising author.

A friend of mine picked up an advance readers copy of this book in New York. The author was featured in an emerging voices session. Authors that bear paying attention to. I couldn't agree more. Calling Out surprised me, not because I'd never given much though to legal escort services in Utah, but because of the beauty of the book. The story moved quickly and the characters were so engaging that it only took a couple of pages to make them friends. The story is beautifully written, with tender moments and a very accurate portrayal of humans, being human. Don't pass this book up! You'll be glad you read it.

Can working in the shady world of escort services bring happiness? Is there redemption for the participants of such sleazy exploitation, especially in Utah, right in the heart of Mormon country? In a bizarre and fascinating tale of good women gone not-so-good, Roxanne works the phones at Premier Escorts, run by a frantic Arab, who also juggles two other businesses as an imported rug merchant and restaurateur. The escort office sandwiched between the other two venues, Roxanne's working environment consists of a windowless room with a phone, desk, television and adjoining tanning-changing room for the ladies. So far she hasn't crossed the line and become an escort, but mired in an emotional vacuum and generally directionless life, the thirty-year-old is balancing precariously. Roxanne, or Jane (her real name), has a great deal of empathy for the outcall girls and for many of their regular customers, at the same time conducting a long-distance relationship with a former lover and allowing another ex-boyfriend, Ford, to use her apartment as a crash pad whenever he is in town. On his latest visit, Ford has brought along his girlfriend du jour, the free-spirited Ember, a cocaine-sniffing beauty who soon decides to explore the lifestyle of the outcall girl. Her days befuddled by the moral ambiguity of her job and an increasingly unsettled and crowded home life, Jane's quickly spirals out of control, smack in the middle of LDS territory. Sometimes almost comic, at others much darker, Meadows reveals the inner workings of the escort service industry, avoiding the more venal aspects through license technicalities (although she hints that some girls take their duties much farther), the particular personalities drawn to this nether world and the human side of such an existence. Courting the chaos of confused identity, low self-esteem and lack of direction, Jane-Roxanne experiments at her own peril, crossing the boundaries of good judgment and healthy self-preservation once too often. With Ember as a catalyst, the distinctions between real life and her job are easily blurred, a shocking reminder how quickly events can turn life-threatening. This novel might have had more punch sans the happy ending, but, over all, Calling Out is instructive and insightful, Meadows a fresh and interesting voice on the scene. Luan Gaines/ 2006.