The News Where You Are

"The News Where You Are" is a melancholy look at life and loss without crossing the line into wallowing hopelessness. Frank Allcroft is a middle-aged anchor for a regional new program in Birmingham, England. Several events come together which cause him to reflect on change and loss in life. His charismatic predecessor, Phil, has been recently killed in a hit-and-run accident while jogging; a man he met once has been found dead on a park bench and no one seems to be able to locate any family; the buildings his father designed in the 1970s are being demolished to make way for the new. These are just a few of the happenings that are examined throughout the novel along with a bit of a mystery surrounding Phil's death. Sometimes I find narratives of this type to be navel-gazing and I want to shake the characters out of their self-absorption. In this case, the reflections are very balanced and the negatives are offset by the inclusion of more positive aspects of the story - Phil's (much) younger wife really loves him and has every intention of standing by his side during his advancing years; Frank's young daughter is a ray of hope with a balanced view of life; and Frank's marriage appears to be solid and loving without all the angst often portrayed. More a character study/societal commentary than anything else without major plot or tension. Beautifully written and a novel well worth a read.

Catherine O'Flynn is a great writer, she transforms small things into a good piece of fiction. Nothing major happened, but there was great writing, and I do like great writing. This is the story about Frank, a news anchor who has been in the business for 20 years. He likes where he is and never wanted to be bigger. He is also a joke, a man famous for bad one-liners. Something that he inherited from his mentor and friend, but he never did get them right. Now Phil is dead, in a strange accident. And Frank is left with his strange hobby as his wife calls is, going to funerals of people who had no one else coming. Frank is a good guy, he likes his job (ok not the crap jokes), but he is a solid guy. He loves his wife and cute little daughter. And he searches for lost relatives for those people who have died without any family showing up. His mum seems constantly depressed, but he visits her. But there is something sad over him, perhaps cos if his search through out the book. But that will change too. The book uses flashbacks to show some clues, Michaels past (the guy whose relatives he is trying to find), some moments from Phil's past, before his death and earlier, and lastly Frank's past. His dad who was always working and his mum who had good and bad days. Life in general, and a search for that which is lost is what this book is about. From people gone, to his dad's buildings being torn down to make new for new ones. And the last sentence of the book tells you everything: "Our absence is what remains of us." It's beautiful and sad at the same time. She has a way of telling is straight, but there is also a subtle humour in this book. A strange book, and a completely normal book at the same time. What I am left with is that she writes great fiction, easy fiction, and fiction that should be noticed. Final thoughts: I do like my genres, and sometimes I need an author who can write beautiful prose, saying a lot, or saying nothing, and she is good. I sometimes like books cos of the story, sometimes for the written word, and this time it was the latter.

How quickly the present becomes the past. How often do we truly enjoy the moment we're living in, appreciate the present, without gazing back in longing, ahead in fear or hope. This is a book about nostalgia, about longing for a past that never really existed. The past only seems better than the present because it is irretrievable. Near the end of the book, Frank tells his daughter that when you're young, life is all in the future; when youre old, it's all in the past. From the wisdom of her eight years, his daughter Mo replies that she lives in the present. Each of the principal characters approaches aging in a unique way, and Frank, who is only 43, is an onlooker, regarding his mother's decline (which contains not a few suprises), and remembering his architect father whose death at 51 may have been caused by career disillusionment. His father's buildings from the 70s are already considered passe and are being demolished sometimes just to create empty lots. Reading is a subjective pleasure, but the craft of writing and of character building displayed throughout every page is so exemplary, it will be hard to top it. The exclusion of this book from the Booker's long lost issued last week baffles me.

I was a big fan of O'Flynn's debut novel, What Was Lost, so I eagerly anticipated her second novel. Although not quite as satisfying as What Was Lost, The News Where You Are was a thoroughly enjoyable and satisfying read--combining humor with affecting examinations into the nature of loss. Loss is a major theme in this book, as it was with her first novel. In this book, our "hero" Frank Allcroft is dealing with loss on all sorts of levels--the loss of his architect father's buildings (which are being knocked down one by one) and the loss of his friend and colleague Phil (who died in a never solved hit-and-run accident). As he shuffles through life, shackled with his corny on-air persona and a gentle loserish air he can't seem to shed (even with his own wife), Frank decides to investigate Phil's death on his own--seeking answers about why the vibrant and successful Phil made some strange phone calls to Frank shortly before his death and the connection between Phil and an elderly man found dead on park bench. Interspersed with this storyline is Frank's memories of his childhood--populated by his workaholic father and unhappy mother. As his father's buildings are demolished one by one, Frank realizes he must come to terms with his own past if he is to have a rewarding future. As in What Was Lost, buildings and the physical surroundings of Birmingham play a large part in the story--becoming almost characters themselves. Like the Green Oaks Shopping Center in What Was Lost, buildings, new subdivisions and the assisted-living center become part of the story--given as much attention by O'Flynn as her human characters. O'Flynn tends to anthropomorphize cities, buildings and houses--imbuing them with meaning and personalities. I personally enjoy this aspect of O'Flynn's books; it makes for interesting reading. "That's what I liked about this city." "What? That it's crap and everything fails?" "No. That it has these ridiculous dreams, that it always tries to reinvent itself, to be the city of the future, but then always changes its minds about what the future should be. I love the little glimpses you catch of the old dreams, the old ideas of what Utopia should be. I think if you get rid of the, no matter how embarrassing or naive they are, then you lose something essential about the place." I think O'Flynn's greatest talent lies in the way she is able to capture with pinpoint accuracy and humor all the little foibles and interior conversations we all have with ourselves but rarely share. I saw so much of myself in Frank as I read--from his need to be polite causing him to be enmeshed in unwanted relationships to his sense of doubt in his own abilities. Consider this excerpt: The motorway was quiet, but he stayed in the slow lane tucked behind a beaten-up van traveling at fifty. Frank secretly held a strong suspicion that he should not be in charge of a vehicle after dark. On city streets all was fine, but on country lanes or unlit stre

In England, middle aged popular news anchor Frank Allcroft overly reflects where his life has been and where he is going. He hates his job and knows how his peers scorn his talent or lack of as they would insist. He struggles with an eternally depressed mother since his father the architect who was never around anyway died. However, the recent death of his buddy Phil shakes Frank to his core as he ponders mortality; that of his own. Frank understands his broadcasting is inane with all the news unfit to air. He wanders the town seeing how many things change yet remains the same. A distraught Frank feels for the lonely people living and dead; visiting graves in which no one cares. He detests urban blight but loathes even more demolition as he is unable to move on unlike his mom who insists good and bad are always memories that need to be demolished so one can move away from the past and live in the present. With a nod to the Beatles' Eleanor Rigby, this is a strong somewhat melancholy character study of someone who reflects on his life and concludes the world is a terrible place to live especially when one feels alone as he does, but dying alone is the punctuation end. Yet in spite of his gloomy outlook on past, present and future, Frank never turns self-pitying as he is stoic believing that's life and death; which ironically leaves the reader with hope. Character study fans will enjoy the story of Frank, caught between a rock and hard place inside his mind yet never quite crushed. The News Where You Are is powerful storytelling Harriet Klausner