Which Brings Me to You

I've enjoyed Steve Almond's previous books, and I know Julianna Baggott and love her work. So I was excited to see how these skillful, prolific writers would handle a co-effort with a terrific premise: two bruised but tough customers skip the quick wedding hookup in favor of no-holds-barred epistolary confessions. Their gamble is they won't thoroughly disgust each other by the time they're through, and might even have a chance at real love. I think it's great that John and Jane, the two otherwise hip and worldly protagonists, chose good old snail mail--the book could have been pulled off in email, but the fact that they chose letters meant they really wanted to slow down and think about what they had to say, to commit to it in a way that a blip on a screen (no matter how long it lives on a server or in the latest NSA database) just can't accomplish. As their stories, and their characters, take shape, you alternately root for and want to slap them. But ultimately, you want them to win. You want them to finally meet again, and find what has eluded them so far, true love. Get it and enjoy!

Between the awkward prelude and the suspenseful coda, authors Steve Almond and Julianna Baggott have protagonists John and Jane volley a series of letters -- each of which could qualify as an award-winning story -- in an attempt to explore and express their respective romantic histories. The hope is that through the letters, they can build a relationship based on full disclosure, self-awareness, and mutual understanding. You'll have to read it yourself to see if this naked soul approach results in redemptive love or aching loss, but along the way you'll guffaw and grimace at their mistakes, and root for their success. "Which Brings Me To You" delivers.

I really liked Steve Almond's other works, and was a little hesitant about this one becuase it was co-authored. It was great though, and I read through it very quickly. I agree that the letters are not necessarily realistic-type letters, but they work as short stories that fit together to build the book. I was overwhelmingly pleased with the book.

The work provides another blow to the straightjacket, mind numbing culture of romance in the good old U.S. of A. The narrative explores two people's past lovers, and they do come close to hooking-up when they first meet at a wedding, but they do not grab the "let's get to know each other" handle as a way to do it the "right way," though the male is the one who pops the 'chute before they sate their lusts. No, what happens is true to life: they realize as they narrate their loves that human beings are incredibly complex and live incredibly complex lives, especially ones who seek an active life, thus there really isn't "the one." They do contemplate the question of whether it's best to be loved or understood, but that's a product of the prevailing culture of romance. What they and the readers come to understand is that our complexity makes sustaining the romantic ideal a fair bet at best. In fact, the two epistolary lovers know at the end that they are both committed to the quest for love, whatever that entails. As Baggott quotes from The Confessions of Saint Augustine, "And what was it that delighted me? Only this--to love and be loved," the two come to realize that the quest for love is part of the human condition, whether you stay with a lover for one month, one year, ten years, forty years is irrelevant. The challenge is whether you are willing to put your heart on the chopping block, and they wonder along with us if many of the ones who continue on are really the ones who have decided to walk off the field, the battle over. The letters are achingly funny and honest, a respite from the dominant simple-minded culture of these early years of the twenty-first century.

Literary writing in the can't put it down format of genre writing. The concept is novel for the free love generation-- protagonists on the verge of not even first date sex decide to get to know each other first via letter writing. Central questions: Do we want to be loved, or do we want to be understood?; If you understand me, will you be able to love me? Past sexual relationships are explored in these letter exchanges, and former lovers come alive with all of their eccentricities and endearing qualities in full display.