How Clarissa Burden Learned to Fly

At first I was a little miffed that there weren't any "real" chapters, but once I noticed how well the flow went with Clarissa's day I relaxed and enjoyed the book.
I felt myself grow just a little right along with Clarissa. I disliked "Iggy" from the get go, and was fantasizing his death right along with Clarissa.

I laughed and cried throughout most of the book and my heart stopped a few times. Overall I will have to keep this one on the shelf to come back to time and again.

~I was provided a copy of this book from Hachette Books for my review.~

I found How Clarissa Burden Learned to Fly a great disappointment. After the reviews of Before Women Had Wings (I admit I bought it but haven't read it), I was expecting a genuine novel with a great plot. What I got was a rehashed Harlequin Romance where the heroine doesn't even actually end up with the "hero" in the end. [I really couldn't care less if a woman ends up alone in a romance; it's actually refreshing.] BUT I do want to actually not know what's going to happen next in the story. Everything is predictable in this story. Well, almost everything. The only redeeming feature of this book is the secondary story of the historical family that owned Clarissa's house before she did. If the entire novel had been centered on those show more people it might have been more worth reading. An even smaller plot point that I found even more fascinating was the lost cemetary and the women and children whose ghosts were residing there. Now that would make a brilliant novel to explore those people. The historical souls who had lived through real tragedies and painful lives just made Clarissa's "writer's block" and sorry-excuse-for-a-marriage even more dull and simplistic. I really wanted to like this book, but the focus was thrown for me once the secondary characters were introduced and Clarissa failed to live up to their intensity. show less

I stumbled across Connie May Fowler's works many years ago and have been enjoying her unusual writing ever since. With her trademarked meandering writing style, imitating and reflecting the heat shimmering over her fictional creation of Hope, Florida, Fowler has created the story of a woman beaten down by life, held hostage to her loveless marriage and her own inadequacies by self-esteem lower than a boa constrictor's belly who will finally rise up and learn to fly on her own.

Clarissa is a writer with two wildly successful books under her belt. She and her husband, Iggy, moved to Hope six months prior to the midsummer day (the summer solstice) during which all events of the story take place. As the day heats and grows, Clarissa watches show more as Iggy cavorts with his nude models (he's an artist or sorts) and is herself followed by a determined ghost who needs Clarissa to tell her terrible story and that of her husband and son as well. It is through the minor interventions of the ghost Olga and the imaginary voices in Clarissa's own head that she grows in strength as the day does, determining that her husband won't bully her anymore, that her opinion of things is valid, and that she has more worth than she's ever given herself for having.

The story seems to almost swirl through the pages, defying conventional narrative techniques. With ghosts unimagined and unacknowledged by Clarissa, a fly drunk on the appealing smell of the main character, a boy with a pet rattler, and a dwarf circus, this book is chock full of the unconventional and the unusual. And despite the craziness, Fowler manages to make this story of a woman's self-realization and strength completely normal and believable. Clarissa takes baby steps throughout her day and while her weaknesses make the reader groan, these small lapses into who she has been for all of her previous life make her newly fledged character all the more realistic. There are twists aplenty contained within and horrors too. The final culmination is a bit rushed but it nicely reinforces Clarissa as a woman with whom to be reckoned, a fighter. Once I picked this one up, I didn't put it down until I was finished, mesmerized as I was by the place, the characters, and the story itself and rooting for Clarissa to break free, to fly. show less

Clarissa's story takes place in a 24 hour period. It wasn't until I had nearly finished the book that I realized how brilliantly Connie May Fowler had paced it. At the beginning, things move slowly because Clarissa is slowly going about her day (and fuming about her husband). As Clarissa gets closer to making the decision to leave her jerk of a husband, the pacing starts to really pick up until it got so that I couldn't put down the book.

I must say that Clarissa really, really annoyed me. While it is reasonable to expect your spouse to take care of a few household tasks, it is quite ridiculous to let your trash pile up for weeks (in the back of your barely running truck no less!) while you complain to yourself that your spouse didn't do show more as asked. Take care of it yourself! Clarissa finally did just that (and it seemed to propel her into getting rid of more than just the trash), but why'd it take so long? show less

Successful writer Clarissa Burden may live in Hope, FL but hope is not necessarily a word in her vocabulary when referring to her own life. She is experiencing writer’s block, her husband. Iggy, mostly ignores her (as he paints naked “models” in the backyard) unless he is acknowledging her presence with complete disdain, her new house is beautiful but possibly haunted, she has an obsessed fly that is stalking her, her only mode of transportation is full of six months of trash, and there is a very odd one-armed stranger (angel?) offering his tree-cutting services. Clarissa’s memories of her horrible, abusive childhood has left her with a lack of self-esteem and a “do I deserve more?” attitude.

How Clarissa Burden Learned to show more Flyby Connie May Fowler follows Clarissa’s day on the summer solstice and oh, how 24 hours can change everything. A rendezvous with a handsome author friend, a trip to the dump and almost drowning in a sunken grave full of quick mud are just some of the unsuspecting events that lead Clarissa on a journey to change her life and allow her to finally fly.

My initial reaction to this book after the first 40 pages or so was confusion and curiosity. I was not sure if I would actually like the main character of Clarissa as she played such a victim of past and present circumstances. I was hoping this would not be the tone of the entire story. It did not take long for me to become completely immersed in this story and to completely become engaged with Clarissa and each and every character – I hated some and laughed at and with others. There was so much more to Clarissa then a dud just letting life run her over. She has recurring daydreams of death scenes of her husband, listens to the ovarian shadow women and speaks with Deepak Chopra as he tells her to toughen up while wearing Liberace glasses.

Ms. Fowler’s storytelling skills are superb. I wanted to walk in the garden surrounding the house. I wanted to visit the general store and drive around the small swamp town meeting the eccentrics that seem to congregate in those out-of-the-way places. There were some fantastical moments and some meandering along trails that actually go nowhere but these add to the overall impact of the book and they all serve a purpose. The conclusion to the story would seem extraordinary if taken out of context but was perfect – satisfying!

If you cannot tell, I loved this book. In fact, I wish I could pretend I have not already had the pleasure of following Clarissa’s life-altering day so I can experience it again! show less

Clarissa Burden is bedeviled by many things: her ass of a husband, a fly who is in love with her, writer's block, a family of ghosts living in her house, and her own insecurities. This book is the story of all of these things and how Clarissa is able to finally release these burdens (no pun intended . . . .well, maybe a little :o) ).

I found this book to be somewhat formulaic in the "terribly wounded woman finally finds her voice and her power" genre. But Ms. Fowler does do some interesting things here, most notably her ability to anthropomorphize animals in such a way that it works quite well in the story and adds to the tale rather than being distracting. Clarissa is a compelling character and while I found her to be somewhat annoying show more in the beginning with her endless cowtowing to her husband, I did want her to succeed and find a way to find her freedom. There is also an interesting backstory about a family who was viciously murdered two centuries ago in the house in which Clarissa and her good for nothing husband live. Their ghosts linger on the property and we discover more of the story, and the history of Florida, as Clarissa learns about the history of her home.

The pace of this books is a bit slow in the beginning, but picks up in the last third. It's not a book I couldn't put down, but I did want to find out what happened, and the last 40-50 pages are compelling and emotional. All in all this book is an enjoyable beach or Sunday afternoon read. Be aware that there is some fairly graphic violence in it in places, but it is not the main theme of the book. show less

Let me say first of all that this was a good read, full of the details that make Southern gothic novels so enjoyable. I was delighted by Fowler's strong narrative voice, and lush descriptions of the Florida landscape. I even enjoyed the ghosts that populated the story- in many ways, their stories seemed much more compelling than Clarissa's ever could.

For me, the difficulty with this novel lay in Clarissa herself, and her enthroned status as a complete doormat. This woman is a successful novelist who tolerates a husband who belittles her and conducts affairs right under her nose even as he lives off of her earnings. He hasn't touched her in years, she is dying by inches inside, and yet she worries about making his lunch or angering him? show more I just couldn't accept that as realistic- she should have kicked his ass to the curb long ago! I always like to find some aspect of a character that I can relate to my own life and story, but with Clarissa, this was just impossible.

That said, I did enjoy the book. I would have liked more followup on the cemetary, and certainly more focus on the story of the house and its ghosts, but at least in the end Clarissa was able to break free (at least in her mind) on the magical longest day of the year. Four stars because I just didn't like Clarissa as much as I liked the writing itself. show less