Mar 7

Mar 7 Book Review : Craig Clevenger - Mother Howl (2023)

In small towns, there is terrible weight to a name. From the moment you’re born, you’re always "the son of" or “the daughter of” and the sins of your progenitors are bestowed upon you. It's an uphill battle not to let it define who you are. Craig Clevenger is a name you don't forget easily. Twenty years after The Contortionist's Handbook, people still foundly remember his brash and original take on neo-noir. I feel like Clevenger is trying to address that haunting in his latest novel, the oddly personal Mother Howl.

This novel tells the story of Lyle Edison, the son of a serial killer, who is trying to make another life for himself under this new identity after years of violent abuse from townsfolk. Following an unfortunate prison sentence, Lyle is out on probation trying to provide for his girlfriend Sera and his daughter to be while managing his stiff parole officer when he crosses paths with a gigantic stranger named Icarus that will alter the course of this parallel existence he's trying to live. He'll be brought back back to who he really is.

Exorcising Ghosts and Becoming Who You Are

Mother Howl was not the book I thought it was when I bought it. It's an existential, highly symbolic novel about the power a name can wield over somebody's life. Lyle changed his name to evade the fallout of his father’s transgressions, but his new name brought him into legal turmoil he can only mitigate by assuming his old one. It’s not the most eventful story you've ever read. It’s moody, atmospheric and contemplative. It’s meant to be read slowly and be reflected upon after each chapter. Of course, I didn’t do that.

So yeah, I might've read Mother Howl wrong (and there is such a thing as reading a novel wrong), but it felt a little miserabilist to me. Lyle is not an interloper who’s running away from his past sins. He’s a poor soul being railroaded by other’s people poor decisions. I could not decide how to feel morally about the fact that he was trying to do the right thing for his wife and kid. It's such a basic standard by which to judge a human being, I couldn’t decide whether he was righteous or pathetic to sire a child in his life situation.

What I'm trying to say here is that Lyle Edison lacks a little bit of novelistic potential as a lead character? His predicament is interesting from an existential standpoint, but his aims were somewhat of a baseline for human decency. even if it involves some self-sacrifice. The way Lyle acts is the way I’d expect anyone with a sense of responsibilities to act under the same circumstances. He is neither heroic in the novelistic sense of the term, neither a coward in the literal sense of the terme. He's just a decent guy.

Maybe I’m a picky reader, but I found Lyle to be more relatable than interesting.

Icarus and the Disavowed Sun

Lyle isn't the only protagonist of Mother Howl to properly speak of. There is also the mysterious Icarus who may or may not be a supernalural presence. He’s undoubtedly fun from a micro, bricks-and-mortar interactions perspective. He calls the police the "men in blue" and understands the world in alien terms, which makes him instantly endearing. He’s a bit of a deus ex machina, though. He would be more at home in his own novel than having to make things happen for poor Lyle all the time.

It's the juxtaposition of the symbolic value of Icarus’ existence and Lyle’s existential quandary that doesn’t one. Neither one needs the other. Lyle needs a social worker and a parole officer who’s not a dick (super well reflected in the scene where a policeman back off him when he names his PO) and Icarus needs a mythical creature to take down. Mother Howl is two different novels cohabiting uncomfortably inside the same pages. It’s full of great ideas, but it gets narratively cacophonous and tonally weird after a while.

As a critic, you often figure out your exact feelings on a novel as you’re writing your review and I liked Mother Howl a little less than I originally thought. I guess that I’m looking to get provoked and challenged in my values quite a lot more than it did here. I don’t think Mother Howl is poorly written or that it insults my intelligence, but it felt to me like a novel that attempted to satisfy many audiences rather than enrapture one and the final product suffered. Oh well. We’ll always have The Contortionnist's Handbook.