Bethanne Patrick interviews Keith Donohue about "Angels of Destruction" on The Book Studio.

From Publishers Weekly
Tweaking some thematic elements of his previous novel, The Stolen Child, Donohoe now tells the story of Norah, a nine-year-old who appears on the doorstep of Margaret Quinn, a widow living a solitary existence in a small Pennsylvania town in 1985. Margaret eagerly takes in Norah to make up for the loss of her own daughter, Erica, who disappeared 10 years earlier after running away to join the Angels of Destruction, a West Coast revolutionary group. Margaret passes off Norah as her granddaughter and enrolls her in school, where Norah becomes friendly with a boy who's been abandoned by his father. Complications ensue when Margaret's sister arrives and has to be convinced that Norah is Erica's daughter. Sandwiched between the story of Margaret and Norah's unusual relationship is the flashback narrative of teenage Erica's road adventures with her boyfriend on their way to join the Angels of Destruction. Norah's unexplained origins form the enigmatic core of this story, and though she comes across as more of a novelistic conceit than a flesh and blood character, the novel movingly illustrates the quest for connection hardwired into every human heart. ( )

Wonderful writing. A small girl appears on the doorstep of Margaret McQuinn. Margaret's daughter ran away when she was in high school. Margaret tells everyone that the small girl is her granddaughter. The girl does magical things. Is she an angel? Also, the search for the runaway daughter begins. EXCELLENT! ( )

Summary: When the mysterious nine-year-old Norah knocks on widow Margaret Quinn's door in the middle of a cold, snowy night, Margaret accepts her into her house without a second thought. Margaret is still grieving over the loss of her daughter Erica, who ten years previously ran away with her boyfriend, intent on joining the revolutionary group Angels of Destruction. Norah quietly steps into the center of Margaret's grief, and takes on the role of Margaret's granddaughter - a link to the daughter she believes is gone forever. But while it's clear that Norah is no ordinary child, it's less clear who - or what - she really is, what her purpose is, and how - or even if - she's connected to the missing Erica.

Review: Angels of Destruction, as a book, feels quite a lot like its main character, Norah: mysterious, slightly ethereal, and filled with an air of sadness and loneliness, but still shot through with hope. The writing, too, is all of those things; even apart from the story they're telling, Donohue somehow manages to fill the words themselves with a sense of loneliness and longing. At the end, I'm not sure that I've entirely wrapped my head around the message and moral of the story, and there are some issues of plotting that I had problems with, but the writing itself was powerful; mesmerizing and haunting enough that after I finished I had to get up and take a walk for an hour just to ground myself again. This is a book to be read on a cold and blustery November evening, or maybe a gray and slushy February day, not a sunny June afternoon.

My reaction to Angels of Destruction is more or less the same as my response to Donohue's first book, The Stolen Child. The plotting was somewhat strange, some characters (particularly Paul, Margaret's husband/Erica's father) were underdeveloped, and enough threads were left unresolved and ambiguous to keep it from being a truly satisfying read. However, for years after finishing The Stolen Child, I would find myself thinking about it at odd moments, and Angels of Destruction feels like it's going to linger in my head, taunting me with its mysteries and open-ended theologies for years to come. 3.5 out of 5 stars.

Recommendation: Hard to say. It's an interesting story, and gorgeously written, but not exactly an easy or fun read. I think it will probably be enjoyed the most by readers of literary fiction who don't mind a fair bit of magical realism and a number of ambiguous story elements. ( )

Donohue captures the somber pace of real emotion very well. It seems as though he's tried to place this book more firmly in the real world than Stolen Child, though, and by doing so actually makes it feel less real than that book with clearer fantasy elements. ( )