*footnotes

by Paul Turner

*footnotes examines the suicide of a young woman and how the act affects three generations of people with whom she shared her life. The story flows from the dry Arizona desert to a growing Las Vegas to the rain-swept Pacific Northwest. This fictional account shares some of the lesser-known aspects and challenges of mental illness. People who carry the weight of mental illness often feel they are insignificant, mere footnotes. In this novel, the burdens of war, childhood trauma, or just merely lousy brain chemistry inspire skills that become part of the characters’ lives, and maybe some of the best parts of who they are. *footnotes uses humor and vivid imagery to bring the reader into this often invisible world.

The western United States provides the setting for some of the best American cinema, no matter the genre. Being very dramatic, it articulates any story and can bring the themes deeper into focus. The desert of the Southwest provides stark, warm tones reflected in the characters. Las Vegas is more than just The Strip. There are places in Sin City, ensconced in the older parts of town that are less glamorous but more curious. The Pacific Northwest is in stark contrast to the deserts of Nevada and the Southwest. The gentle greens and greys can be somber and calming, which can slow down a narrative and give the characters more space to develop.

Malcolm enters the story as a boy of exceptional abilities who must keep them to himself to survive in a rural speck on the map. As adulthood comes, he leaves his toxic family and finds a place in the military where he grows into a complicated but kind man.

Buzz is the kind of doctor you would expect to see sitting in the diner a block off an Arizona main street. He learned his skills in the army, and his brand of down-home, hands-on care can help his patients believe everything will be just fine.

Nora starts on the streets of Vegas. She’s sure she’ll find happiness in the land of possibilities until she gambles on a job that takes her out of the big city and drops her in an old hotel in a desert town.

Michael’s childhood explodes beneath him. He is tossed from a loving home into a series of institutions that try to break him. When he is mainstreamed back into a typical high school, his experience at the hands of the police provide insulation from the growing pains of being a teenager.

The people in *footnotes are complex and as likable as they are accessible. None of them are just one thing. Each experiences significant metamorphosis as the story flows. Issues of sexuality are acknowledged without bludgeoning the reader. The characters are just being who they are without perpetuating stereotypes. All of them circle around a crime that binds them with often invisible threads.

365 pages, Paperback

Published December 2, 2019

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads database.

Paul Turner is pastor of St. Anthony Parish in Kansas City, Missouri. A priest of the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph, he holds a doctorate in sacred theology from the Athenaeum of Saint Anselm in Rome. He is the author of Glory in the Cross: Holy Week in the Third Edition of The Roman Missal, When Other Christians Become Catholic, and many other titles. He is a former President of the North American Academy of Liturgy and a team member for the North American Forum on the Catechumenate. He is a member of Societas Liturgica and the Catholic Academy of Liturgy. He serves as a facilitator for the International Commission on English in the Liturgy.