Customer Reviews

Dialogues: A Novel of Suspense

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3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This book is a tease - it calls itself a novel of "suspense," but there is no real suspense, and any suspense that there actually is is left unrequited in the end. You go through the entire book waiting to find out why Tory killed her six co-workers. You never find out, and the ending is the biggest cop-out since "Son of Rosemary, The Sequel to Rosemary's Baby". How could the publisher have allowed the author to end this book in that cliched fashion? I felt truly cheated.

After a lifetime of writing nonfiction on every possible conceivable--and some clearly inconceivable--subject under the sun, Stephen Spignesi switches gears and wrote his first novel. As most writers well tell you, switching gears like this isn't easy: Stephen King, in fact, is on record saying that he rarely writes book-length fiction because, as he discovered, after writing DANSE MACABRE, it's plain hard work, whereas storytelling (i.e., writing fiction) is for him like stretching out in a hammock on a warm summer afternoon.

With this book, Spignesi has gone into high gear. Rather than self-publish, publish an e-book, or publish this as a print-on-demand book -- all the things lesser writers do just in an attempt to get in print -- Spignesi set his sights high and went to the largest publisher in the world, Random House, where he found the kind of enthusiasm for the work he was looking for. The result is the right author at the right house, and the result for you, the reader, is a compelling, unputdownable read from page on to the final page.

More a novel of character than plot, Spignesi gets deep inside the head of Victoria ("Tory") Troy. Most of the book, as the title suggests, is written in dialogue, which is a neat trick to pull off: I can't think of a lot of veteran fiction writers who would have attempted it, since writing convincing dialogue is damned tough. One false note, one misplaced word, and the dialogue sounds, and reads, like pulp fiction.

Of the story itself, I would be doing you a disservice if I were to tell you the plot. Besides, it ain't the plot that's important -- it's the telling. Spignesi, who has dozens of nonfiction books under his belt, has an authoritative storytelling voice that serves him well in his fiction. The confidence he shows in the storytelling is more like that of a veteran storyteller who knows his craft. Spignesi knows what he's doing.

And of the ending, well, don't expect me to tell you the butler did it. Go read this fascinating, intriguing, compelling, and damned impressive first novel for yourself and make up your own mind.

This is an impressive first fiction debut and heralds the arrival of a new, important voice of a writer who goes on my list of Writers to Watch.

'Dialogues' is a "MUST READ" for all fans of suspense, drama, horror, mystery, legal thrillers! It's the gripping tale of a young woman named Victoria (Tory) Troy. Though young, she's exceptionally bright, has a very charming personality, and has formed many insightful concepts about how the world, and the people in it, treat each other... and animals. She's an animal lover at heart, but has decided to take a job as a Euthanasia Technician at a local Connecticut Animal Shelter. Every Friday, she's in charge of the detestable act of putting large numbers of animals "to sleep." She hates her job, obviously, but needs the money to survive. Unfortunately, her job finally gets to her, and she snaps under the pressure. Six people are now dead.

Enter Dr. Baraku Bexley. Bexley, the doctor assigned to her case, at the local Psychiatric Hospital, where Tory now resides under lock and key, interviews Tory extensively to determine if she's fit to stand trial. Through many conversations (dialogues) with Tory, her family, a former teacher, and others involved in the case, Bexley makes an informed decision. Now, it's in the hands of the Jury.

This is a captivating, "can't put down" book! From Prolugue to Epilogue, Stephen Spignesi takes the reader on an unforgettable journey. "Tory's story" is beautifully crafted, with an ending that packs a punch!

On a more personal level, I've read many of Spignesi's non-fiction books: all his Stephen King work, The Robin Williams Scrapbook, The Odd Index, The Cat Book of Lists, The Complete Titanic, What's Your Mad About You I.Q., What's Your Friends I.Q, just to name a few. So I was already aware that he's an exceptional writer!

Dialogues, his first novel, blew me away. It went so far beyond my expectations of what a "first novel" could be. It's well thought out, it's brilliantly written, the characters evolve from "words on a page," into real people. Their voices, through the many dialogues, are heard loud and clear. The crime is gruesome, yet - I believe - Tory will remain beloved to all who read the story that unfolds.

This book really sucked me in through the unusual format of advancing the novel through a series of terse dialogues. Spignesi deftly juggles weighty themes and presents some really gorgeous, haunting images, especially one of the protagonist surrounded by a flock of seagulls. People will either love or hate the ending. This reader found it quite moving.

Since the police arrested her for six murders, several people have conversed with Tory Troy including her lawyer in a guarded mental hospital. However, the most persistent psychiatrist Dr. Baraku Bexley has interviewed Tory several times to ascertain whether the genius can delineate right from wrong enough to stand trial in a Connecticut court.

Over a year ago, Tory lost her job at a pharmaceutical firm that felt the Internet was a better way to sell drugs. Before she left, Tory stole a paralytic drug that leaves victims conscious but paralyzed. Tory obtained worked as a euthanasia technician at the Waterbridge Animal Shelter in Connecticut, where every Friday she kills animals in a gas chamber.

Tory detests her job, but needs the income as she has no other prospects. As she turns into a loner, her loathing for her work converts towards her peers until she decides to take action. Using the paralytic she stole, Tory begins injecting fellow shelter employees and while they remain awake kills them in the gas chamber.

Through the dialogues with Tory at the mental hospital readers get a picture of what happened that drove the woman into killing her peers. Additionally, the audience obtains several other dialogues besides the central figure as her distraught parents, the judge, the prosecution team, the jurors, and others discuss Tory. Interestingly fans also get a different side to the indicted murderer through a strong short story and novella she wrote that adds to the feel that we are looking at a real person wondering why. By the uncanny climax, Stephen Spignesi will have readers exchanging dialogues on this insightful uniquely rendered thriller.

Harriet Klausner

Stephen Spignesi is currently teaching my Writing for Publication class at the University of New Haven. This guy knows his stuff. This is his first novel and I think it is fantastic. The banter between the Doctor and Tory throughout the book can sometimes be comical, daunting, and revealing as the book progresses. With the book consisting mostly of dialogue, the author finds a way to advance the plot, characters, and relationships without comprimising his vision. Great Novel.

This book was not a thriller in any sense of the word. Besides page after graphic page of instuctions on how to euthanize an animal (or person), the entire book consists of boring conversations between people, with only occasional lines to spur the story along. About a third of the way through I just started skimming the pages because it was too boring to read. And the ending... ugh. But at that point I was beyond caring, I was just so glad it was over.

I just finished this novel and had to email you and tell you how much I LOVED it. I couldn't put it down! The Baby's Room was so emotional for me. I lost my daughter to premature birth 24 years ago next month, and this short story really hit home. I was totally blown away with the emotions conveyed. It took me back in time and I 'relived' so much of the trauma and psychological upheaval Sarah was going through... I can't believe the talent that it would take to write like that without ever having lived through it yourself. Your are an amazing writer, and I fervently hope that you will write much more fiction in the years to come!
Whenever I read a novel, I have got to really care about the character, and I can't remember a time that I have felt that way more than I did about Tory. You did such a superb job of getting the reader into the character in a way that I have never experienced before.
Thanks so much for writing this novel!!!!!!

Cathy Quebedeau
South Bend, IN

The style of this book reminds me of the movie, Jacob's Ladder. However, at the end of Jacob's Ladder the story comes full circle. The actions in the first part of the movie make sense and become relevent. Unfortunately, the end of this book did the exact opposite. It rendered the entire story useless.
I was fascinated as I was reading the book and it was beautifully written, thus the 3 star rating. I'm just dissapointed that I put emotional stock in any of the characters (or their unusual names) as it was pointless.
On a side note - one (of the many things) that bugged me as I completed this book and thought back through it's contents, was why does Tory tell her nurse the poigniant story of her 15 year old cat, Gandalf dying of kidney failure and her mother states in the courtroom that Tory only had one cat, Henry?? Again, I guess I was unknowingly putting too much thought into this book which didn't deserve it.

Stephen Spignesi is an indefatigable wordsmith, having written literally dozens of works dealing with popular culture in general and icons such as Stephen King and the Beatles in particular. DIALOGUES is Spignesi's first foray into the world of fiction, and it is a haunting, memorable work on a number of levels.

DIALOGUES is told primarily in dialogue form; the book's overwhelming majority consists of conversations, transcripts and letters. There are exceptions, including two short stories and a novella, and a haunting prologue and epilogue. Tory Troy is a euthanasia technician at an animal shelter. Readers learn that this is an unusual position for this young woman to have, given what we come to know about her personality. Troy's life is full of contradictions, the greatest of which is manifested when she enters the shelter one Friday and murders six of her co-workers for reasons even she cannot explain.

Conversations with Troy and her defense attorney, mother and the court-appointed psychologist contemporaneously tell us much about Troy, but only hint at her motive, often clouding it even more than revealing it. Some school essays --- a one-page narrative from first grade, and a short story and novella from a high school creative writing course --- also drop hints as to who she is, what she has done, and more importantly, her state of mind --- yet nothing is clear until the very end. The dialogues herein actually tell us as much, if not more, about Troy's opposite number in any particular conversation than they do about Troy herself. Some of the most revealing conversations, in fact, are the ones that do not involve Troy at all, such as those among jurors during the deliberations involving her murder trial, or the sidebar conversations between Troy's defense attorney, the prosecutor and the judge.

What Spignesi has created in DIALOGUES is a work that transcends genres. While a novel of suspense, it is also a mystery, a character study, a courtroom thriller, and a more general work of fiction. In addition it is, interestingly enough, somewhat of a theological treatise, a work that is much deeper than it may initially seem, in a way that is only revealed after its conclusion. And though it is not manifestly obvious, Spignesi plays fairly with the reader as he proceeds to the astonishing ending. There was a point during my reading of the work when I realized what he was doing and immediately rejected my conclusion, which ultimately turned out to be correct.

Mysteries and conclusions aside, however, DIALOGUES almost perfectly captures and encapsulates a personality type. All of us know someone like Tory Troy, someone whom we might describe unkindly as "mousy" or charitably with the sobriquet "still waters run deep." You will never think of such an individual again without this book coming to mind.

Spignesi has several nonfiction projects in various stages of development as of this writing. Should he return to the world of fiction, however, DIALOGUES will be tough to top.

--- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub