Aberrations
- ISBN13: 9781934572030
- Condition: USED - VERY GOOD
- Notes:
Product Description
Twenty-one-year-old narcoleptic Angel Duet knows her father harbors secrets. He loves and protects her, but his suspicious refusal to discuss her mother s death drives Angel to worship an image created from the little history she does have: her father’s sketchy stories and her mother’s treasured photography, studies of clouds that have hung in the their foyer for more than twenty years.
When her father’s girlfriend moves in, the photographs come down, and Angel’s search for truth becomes an obsession. As she struggles to uncover the past and gain control over the narcolepsy that often fogs her world, Angel descends into a dizzying realm of drugs, adultery, and confused desire that further obscures reality.
As Angel begins to expose a history she could never have imagined, she discovers her entire life has been anchored around lies. Accepting the truth, once found, is the key to understanding herself, her family, and her life. To truly awaken, Angel must realize that sometimes the gifts we receive are not what we want–and only in time do we see their worth.
At first glance, Aberrations is the story of a young woman who learns to live with her narcolepsy, and who struggles immensely to understand how her mom died when she was born and to discover who her mother really was. But the debut novel of Penelope Przekop moves insightfully into a whole other dimension, showing the reader how each of us lives a life of aberration, that we each have some kind of stigma or conflict or handicap to overcome. We also discover that having the strength to first seek out the truth and then to live with it can be quite challenging.
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Tags: gain control, adultery, aberration, more than twenty years, first glance, debut novelRelated posts:
Aberrations is an extraordinary debut novel for Penelope Przekop. This is not just a coming of age story, it is truly an awakening.
Angel Duet is a 21-year-old narcoleptic living in Louisiana during the 1980’s. Her mother died when she was born, and all that Angel has of her mother are stories told to her by her father, and a series of cloud photographs taken by her mother.
When her father’s new girlfriend moves in, the pictures come off the wall and Angel finds her familiar life turned upside down. She feels the loss of the pictures as another person would feel a parent’s death. Throughout the story we see her searching for the one thing she’s never felt, but needs so acutely - a mother’s love. This search will lead her down a dark path of drugs and sexual experimentation, before ultimately leading her to demand real answers from her father.
Aberrations is an intriguing look into the secrets people keep and their motivations for keeping them. Every character has something that they want to hide from others: a medical condition, their sexuality, an extra-marital affair. As the story progresses, we glimpse each character’s secret. Some secrets, once revealed, are liberating for the characters. Others are absolutely devastating. The secrets that Angel’s father has kept from her concerning her mother will irrevocably change her life.
Przekop has crafted some truly fascinating characters in this novel. I found myself drawn to each character, but I was most drawn to Angel. As a person living with a chronic illness, I easily identified with Angel’s struggle with narcolepsy and her desire to not allow the illness to define her.
Powerful and stirring, Aberrations is one of the best books I’ve read so far this year. Don’t miss this one!
Rating: 5 / 5
Aberrations
As Billy Joel once said, “Honesty is such a lonely word”. Aberrations is a book which brought this subject to mind. It speaks to a desire which all humanity shares: we just want someone to be honest with us. Angel Duet is a character who is achingly human: passionate yet flawed, struggling with physical limitations compounded by the damage dishonesty can do to the human heart, and still hoping, ever searching, always hungering to find the truth. I absolutely love Penelope’s writing style; she pulled me in from the very first paragraph and made me want to keep reading. This book is at once engaging, entertaining and thought-provoking. Penelope, please keep them coming!
Rating: 5 / 5
Aberrations
This book was recommended by a colleague, another R.N. I’m usually disppointed by authors that try to incorporate medical concepts into a complex story line but this author did not disappoint. The medical concepts were accurate throughout the entire story. The book follows Angel, a young woman afflicted with narcolepsy. Angel is coping with the loss of her mother and dealing with a legacy of family lies she is now determined to uncover. Angel’s search for answers leads her to some unlikey discoveries, including most importantly, self-discovery. Igive this book high marks…a great read!
Rating: 5 / 5
Aberrations
Penelope Przkop’s book, Aberrations, is a vivid look into the aberrations in all of us. Angel Duet is a flawed character surrounded by and attracted to other flawed individuals. Rather than painting a picture of life as it should be, Przkop challenges us to cope with life as it is–raw, real, and sometimes uncomfortable to acknowledge. Her blend of literary reflection and suspenseful storyline keeps the reader riveted. I just had to know what Angel Duet’s father was hiding!
~Scott Heydt
[...]
Rating: 4 / 5
Aberrations
What I found most enjoyable about this novel was the exploration of the need for truth. Ms. Przekop makes good use of the idea of being trapped by lies - almost everyone in the novel is harmed by the lies they live with. Watching Angel “wake up” enough to begin to recognize the lies, and become transformed through her journey to truth was enlightening. And I liked that Carla wasn’t the “evil stepmom” but the agent for introducing truth. This is a “southern” novel, and some of the vernacular was intrusive for me - I kept being surprised by “thang”. Also, I was uncomfortable with Angel’s thoughts that a baby would make everything different - that she would have someone to fill that “mother” need. Too many girls have babies to “get” something, instead of “give” something. Fortunately, Angel has a good support system to make sure her baby is well-cared for. My copy has a great set of book club questions.
Rating: 4 / 5
Aberrations