Ramona’s got a bratty boss, a toddler teetering through toilet training, a critical mom who doesn’t mind sharing, and oops—a cheating husband. That’s how a Category Four hurricane bearing down on her life in Savannah becomes just another item on her to-do list. In the next forty-eight hours she’ll add a neighborhood child and the class guinea pig named Clarence Thomas to her entourage as she struggles to evacuate town.
Ignoring the persistent glow of her minivan’s check engine light, Ramona navigates police check points, bathroom emergencies, demands from her boss, and torrential downpours while fielding calls and apology texts from her cheating husband and longing for the days when her life was like a Prince song, full of sexy creativity and joy.
None of This Would Have Happened if Prince Were Alive, the debut novel by Carolyn Prusa, releases on November 22 of 2022. Atria Books provied an early galley for review.
I have been devoted to Prince since 1981. I remember the day vividly when the news broke that he had passed on April 21, 2016. I was devastated, and I still feel that loss over six years later. So, no surprise, the title of this book immediately captured my full attention. I needed to read this one.
While Prince does get mentioned a few times over the course of 330+ pages (just over a half dozen instances, including song references), it is only in a very general sense. It is not overly critical to the tale, but it does add some familiar color to which I can relate. I appreciated that. It's something I could see myself doing in my own writing.
The book is really about a mother on the edge, trying to juggle everything and everybody in the midst of a natural disaster. Sticking with a Prince theme, "Let's Go Crazy" would be an apropos song to describe it. Throughout, there are numerous flashbacks that fill the reader in on Ramona's life before the harried events of the two-day present. As a writer myself, I noticed a few tricks that Prusa used in how the flashbacks were conveyed (sort of a way to put her own signature on them). Some of the flashbacks dropped in more seamlessly than others. As for the present day plot, it does not run an expected course which adds to the tension and stakes. The ending felt mostly resolved though open for potential further exploration of the characters if the author desired.
In the end, this was a quick and easy read. For those looking for something that moves with a general-friendly plot, this would qualify.
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