Tuesday, April 28, 2009

The Late Lamented Molly Marx by Sally Koslow


On a rainy, February night, Molly Marx went for a bike ride along the Hudson river and there she died. Was it an accident? Suicide? Murder? It's the question her family, friends and Detective Hicks are asking themselves. In fact, it's the question Molly is asking herself.

She doesn't remember much of what happened that night. It's all too new. As she watches her loved ones from The Duration, she remembers the events in her life that led to her last few days on earth.

There have been other books written from the Afterlife, of course, but this one is unique for several reasons. The author, Sally Koslow, gives Molly new "powers" in the Duration. She is able to hear the thoughts of the living and she can blink from New York to Chicago in an instant. It's a clever device which allows us to know the thoughts of the other characters, while remaining a 1st person narrative. We're also given "flashbacks" to Molly's life, but unlike some other books, these aren't prompted by anything other than Molly herself. While Molly does have a guide to the afterlife, he's more like a mentor who helps her acclimate to her new surroundings.

The ending was poignant, and not at all what I expected. It left me thinking about my own life and the people who are important to me. If this was the author's intention, as I believe it was, then her ideas were realized.

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About Me

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I'm human, so I've got some issues, but all things considered I guess I'm reasonably normal. My parents are still married. My best friends are my sisters...okay, so I'm normal for the 1850's whatever. I'm opinionated and nerdy. I'm walking the line between tweener-style pop culture love (witness my ever-burning New Kids love and inexplicable Twilight obsession) and elitist culture snob (I can't seem to get enough 19th century British Lit and historical biographies) but, after 30 years, I'm finally learning not to give a crap what anyone else thinks about me. Oh, and those are my feet in the picture. The socks were made by a friend.

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