05/19/2014 In Hellenga’s (The Sixteen Pleasures) latest novel, a Latin scholar on the precipice of old age wistfully recounts her life—beginning in 1963, the year she and her husband “joined our bodies—if not our souls.” Francis Godwin, a lapsed Catholic and graduating senior at Knox College in Illinois (where Hellenga has taught since 1968), met Paul at a party in celebration of Shakespeare’s birthday. “Paul and I began a torrid affair—at least that’s how I thought of it at the time, though ‘torrid,’ from Latin torridus, meaning parched or scorched, — is perhaps not the right word.” Their marriage was a meeting of the minds, but also a pairing of opposites: “He loved Homer, I loved Vergil; he turned to Plato for his metaphysics, I turned to Lucretius.” In the last year of Paul’s life, their grown daughter Stella’s reprobate husband, Jimmy, wreaks havoc on their quiet lives, triggering a primal virulence within Francis unknown even to herself. Reeling from the aftershock of her impulsivity, which goes unpunished, she must reevaluate herself and her faith. The minor characters aren’t as strong as Francis, but Hellenga’s feisty and learned narrator, who travels from the Casa di Giulietta in Verona to TruckStopUSA in Ottawa, is an entertaining guide. (July)
“I stayed up all night with Robert Hellenga's beguiling schoolteacher-murderer and her talkative God, and will now re-read at leisure to savor this author's usual grace notes: music, recipes, learning, philosophy, and travel. The Confessions of Frances Godwin is Hellenga's most audacious fling at just about everything in our culture.” Gail Godwin, author of Flora
“Robert Hellenga is a great storyteller and a most elegant writer. The Confessions of Frances Godwin is a page-turner that made me want to linger on the page.” Hilma Wolitzer, author of An Available Man
“As enjoyable as it is profound, The Confessions of Frances Godwin tackles our most unanswerable questions as only a novel can--not by answering them but by exploring the reasons why we ask in the first place. This is the sort of rare book where the familiar starts to look brand-new, and a reader comes to understand that faith is as much about how one sees as it is about what one believes.” Peter Orner, author of Last Car Over the Sagamore Bridge
“His latest novel [is] one of his best . . . Hellenga . . . is one of those writers who inspire a special kind of devotion in their readers . . . The beauty of this novel and, in fact, of all of Hellenga's work, lies in the scrupulous attention he pays to those different shapes that life takes. Like Frances, we find in their very concreteness a way of living with the uncertainty that surrounds us.” Booklist, special feature starred review
“Hellenga's fiesty and learned narrator, who travels from the Casa di Giulietta in Verona to TruckStopUSA in Ottawa, is an entertaining guide.” Publishers Weekly
“In this highly original novel exploring the hidden depths of one older woman, Hellenga (The Sixteen Pleasures ) shows that he is a writer who deserves to be more widely known.” Library Journal
“Hellenga neatly balances the pallet trucks of the wholesale produce business with the idiosyncrasies of translating the ribald poetry of Catullus . . . Although the story ranges wide, The Confessions of Frances Godwin is firmly rooted in the culture and values of Hellenga's perfectly rendered Midwest.” Shelf Awareness
“Hellenga creates a teacher you will wish you had studied with, and a character to remember.” Saint Louis Post-Dispatch
“Gripping and unpredictable . . . . The Confessions of Frances Godwin both sums up and surpasses Hellenga's body of work. This is a story of maturity by maturity for maturity, written with subtlety, deep learning, and wisdom.” Mary Doria Russell, The Washington Post
“One heck of a plot . . . Hellenga, the famously philosophical novelist . . . is ‘inclined,' he recently wrote on his blog, ‘to accept the accumulated wisdom of the ancient near East' but . . . ‘can't entirely abandon the quest for some larger meaning.' It is this quest for meaning that this latest book, like much of Hellenga's work, is all about.” Chicago Tribune
I stayed up all night with Robert Hellenga's beguiling schoolteacher-murderer and her talkative God, and will now re-read at leisure to savor this author's usual grace notes: music, recipes, learning, philosophy, and travel. The Confessions of Frances Godwin is Hellenga's most audacious fling at just about everything in our culture.
author of Flora Gail Godwin
Robert Hellenga is a great storyteller and a most elegant writer. The Confessions of Frances Godwin is a page-turner that made me want to linger on the page.
author of An Available Man Hilma Wolitzer
As enjoyable as it is profound, The Confessions of Frances Godwin tackles our most unanswerable questions as only a novel can--not by answering them but by exploring the reasons why we ask in the first place. This is the sort of rare book where the familiar starts to look brand-new, and a reader comes to understand that faith is as much about how one sees as it is about what one believes.
author of Last Car Over the Sagamore Bridge Peter Orner
His latest novel [is] one of his best . . . Hellenga . . . is one of those writers who inspire a special kind of devotion in their readers . . . The beauty of this novel and, in fact, of all of Hellenga's work, lies in the scrupulous attention he pays to those different shapes that life takes. Like Frances, we find in their very concreteness a way of living with the uncertainty that surrounds us.
special feature starred review Booklist
Hellenga neatly balances the pallet trucks of the wholesale produce business with the idiosyncrasies of translating the ribald poetry of Catullus . . . Although the story ranges wide, The Confessions of Frances Godwin is firmly rooted in the culture and values of Hellenga's perfectly rendered Midwest.
Hellenga creates a teacher you will wish you had studied with, and a character to remember.
Saint Louis Post-Dispatch
Gripping and unpredictable . . . . The Confessions of Frances Godwin both sums up and surpasses Hellenga's body of work. This is a story of maturity by maturity for maturity, written with subtlety, deep learning, and wisdom.
The Washington Post Mary Doria Russell
One heck of a plot . . . Hellenga, the famously philosophical novelist . . . is 'inclined,' he recently wrote on his blog, 'to accept the accumulated wisdom of the ancient near East' but . . . 'can't entirely abandon the quest for some larger meaning.' It is this quest for meaning that this latest book, like much of Hellenga's work, is all about.
06/15/2014 What transgressions would a retired high school Latin teacher in Illinois have to confess? You'd be surprised. In this fictional "spiritual autobiography," Frances Godwin looks back at the unexpected twists and turns her life has taken in this nuanced character study of a complex woman. Frances and her late husband, Paul, a college professor, shared a deep love of music, literature, and, especially, all things Italian. (Italy is almost a character itself in this novel.) Frances has known her share of trouble over the years; her daughter, Stella, has an unerring instinct for choosing the worst possible boyfriends. When lowlife Jimmy viciously abuses Stella, Frances takes the law into her own hands, surprising herself and the reader. Hellenga tackles some big questions here, but not without humor. In a state of crisis, the protagonist suddenly begins hearing what she assumes is the voice of God, even though she doesn't really believe in him. VERDICT In this highly original novel exploring the hidden depths of one older woman, Hellenga (The Sixteen Pleasures) shows that he is a writer who deserves to be more widely known. [See Prepub Alert, 1/26/14.]—Leslie Patterson, Rehoboth, MA
2014-05-12 Catullus, the confession box, a loaded gun and a muscle car punctuate a former teacher's memories in a novel rich with life and strangely awkward.Entering retirement after teaching Latin for 41 years in Illinois, Frances Godwin begins to write of her past in what becomes a "spiritual autobiography" as she ponders love, regrets, losses and wrongs unredressed. Her 33-year marriage ends painfully as her husband slowly succumbs to lung cancer. She can't forgive herself for not granting some of his wishes. She's also troubled by her violence in dealing with her daughter's abusive husband, then struggles with the Roman Catholic imperative to formally confess her sin. As happens to many of the main characters in the six previous novels by Hellenga (Snakewoman of Little Egypt, 2010, etc.), this Midwesterner goes to Italy, where she unburdens her soul to a priest whose reaction is laissez faire. Odder still are a meeting with her dead husband and her conversations with the voice of God. They're presented as literal chats—comic, ironic, combative (the Almighty on Bill Clinton: "I told him to keep it in his pants"). There's another sort of deity in the deus ex machina supplied by the valuable vintage car she left covered for years in her garage. With a woman as intelligent and well-grounded as Frances—a published translator of Catullus, an accomplished pianist, a lover of beauty, a seeker of life's pith—these implausible elements raise unfortunate doubts about whether she should be taken seriously.A resourceful storyteller, Hellenga presents a likable heroine confronting guilt, self-doubt and wavering faith, a woman strong enough to do just fine without divine intervention.