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A review by judithdcollins
The Thing about December by Donal Ryan
3.0
A special thanks to Steerforth Press and NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.
In The Thing About December, by Donal Ryan, the innocent Johnsey Cunliffe finds his sheltered rural Irish life suddenly disintegrating. Following the deaths first of his father and then his mother, Johnsey inherits the family farm, and a healthy bank account, both of which he proves incapable of managing on his own. He's exposed to the terrifying responsibility of owning land that's in demand for a local real estate development plan. The locals think he is holding out for a huge sum for the farm.
Johnsey takes you month by month through the tragic events that happen in one year of his life and the misconceptions of others around him. An orphan, Johnsey is bewildered by the world around him, defenseless against the bullies and the schemers in his rural village.
Johnsey remains a lonely man struggling to keep up with a world that moves faster than he does. A gentle, simple soul who is virtually incapable of expressing himself verbally; however, in doing so he is able to communicate a powerful story through the pages of THE THINGS OF DECEMBER.
It appears, Ryan wrote The Thing About December before The Spinning Heart., where he used multiple narrators to express a community’s passions and anxieties after Ireland’s economic crash, while Johnsey’s singular story is set in the same village, a decade earlier, as the Celtic Tiger is starting to rear up.
Your love for this character grows, while Johnsey’s recuperation in hospital is the novel’s turning point. The first half of The Thing About December portrays his unhappy youth but the second contains laugh-out-loud moments, even as his neighbors try to force him to sell the farm to developers.
A heartbreaking novel mixed with humor, (you will cry and laugh)—a tale of a man’s struggle to make sense of a greedy and corrupt world. I look forward to reading Donal Ryan's debut novel, The Spinning Heart which I have not read.
“People are better inside in your head. When you're longing for them, they're perfect.” ― Donal Ryan, The Thing About December
In The Thing About December, by Donal Ryan, the innocent Johnsey Cunliffe finds his sheltered rural Irish life suddenly disintegrating. Following the deaths first of his father and then his mother, Johnsey inherits the family farm, and a healthy bank account, both of which he proves incapable of managing on his own. He's exposed to the terrifying responsibility of owning land that's in demand for a local real estate development plan. The locals think he is holding out for a huge sum for the farm.
Johnsey takes you month by month through the tragic events that happen in one year of his life and the misconceptions of others around him. An orphan, Johnsey is bewildered by the world around him, defenseless against the bullies and the schemers in his rural village.
Johnsey remains a lonely man struggling to keep up with a world that moves faster than he does. A gentle, simple soul who is virtually incapable of expressing himself verbally; however, in doing so he is able to communicate a powerful story through the pages of THE THINGS OF DECEMBER.
It appears, Ryan wrote The Thing About December before The Spinning Heart., where he used multiple narrators to express a community’s passions and anxieties after Ireland’s economic crash, while Johnsey’s singular story is set in the same village, a decade earlier, as the Celtic Tiger is starting to rear up.
Your love for this character grows, while Johnsey’s recuperation in hospital is the novel’s turning point. The first half of The Thing About December portrays his unhappy youth but the second contains laugh-out-loud moments, even as his neighbors try to force him to sell the farm to developers.
A heartbreaking novel mixed with humor, (you will cry and laugh)—a tale of a man’s struggle to make sense of a greedy and corrupt world. I look forward to reading Donal Ryan's debut novel, The Spinning Heart which I have not read.
“People are better inside in your head. When you're longing for them, they're perfect.” ― Donal Ryan, The Thing About December