Customer Reviews

Love in the Asylum: A Novel

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Love is a complicated thing. It is complicated enough without the added stresses of extreme factors such as mental or physical illness, drug addiction or a difficult childhood. But as Lisa Carey demonstrates in her latest novel, LOVE IN THE ASYLUM, love happens and flourishes regardless of such circumstances. And sometimes love grows in the most unlikely of places.

Alba Elliot, a children's author, has been suffering with debilitating mental illness for the past ten years. She has been in and out of the Abenaki Mental Hospital all of that time. Cool and jaded, masking a deep sadness and loss, Alba feels comfortable in the walls and on the lawns of Abenaki. When heroin addict Oscar Jameson is admitted to the drug rehab unit, Alba's comfort is challenged. The attraction between the two is almost instantaneous, but neither is prepared emotionally for what they are feeling. Thirty-year-old Oscar is detoxing and is not convinced rehab is the place for him or that he is finally done with drugs. He is fascinated by Alba but still preoccupied with drugs and his own issues, not in the least his troubled relationship with his brother. Alba likes Oscar but hates the fact that he is a junkie. Both have a complicated past that colors all they do and feel in the present. Still, on the lawn of Abenaki, something is developing between them.

Around the time Oscar is checked into Abenaki, Alba, while working in the hospital library, comes across a series of letters from a woman who was a patient to her young son. In the 1930s Mary Doherty was put in the hospital by her husband, and there she remained until she died almost ten years later. She was accused of hysteria, of setting fires and believing herself to be a powerful healer in touch with the realm of the dead. As Alba reads the letters, never sent as Mary was forbidden contact with her family, she learns more and more of Mary's tragic history. Mary, whose real name was Mesatawe, was an Abenaki Indian, gifted with a unique power (diagnosed later by doctors as epilepsy and treated with electroshock therapy), and a drive to help heal the other women at the hospital. As we read the letters along with Alba we learn of Mary's special connection to her son Peter, the intended recipient of the letters.

Mary's letters to Peter reopen a never quite healed wound in Alba, and soon Alba and Oscar run away from the hospital in search of the now elderly Peter and a type of healing impossible within the walls of Abenaki.

LOVE IN THE ASYLUM is not just the story of Alba and Oscar, although their tentative, sweet and emotionally difficult affair is at the center of the novel. It is also the story of familial love. There is the enabling love between Alba and her father, and there is the frustrating love between Oscar and his brother, where a violent past lays just below the surface. There is especially the love of mothers for sons; Mary's for Peter and the raw love that Alba feels for the son she lost a decade ago.

Carey's novel is wonderfully written, honest and emotional without sentimentality. It is simply a joy to read. She successfully weaves the stories of Alba, Oscar and Mary and unifies them into a poignant whole. The devastating losses felt by the characters are offset with just enough humor to keep the novel from being sappy, boring or overly tragic. Despite the fact that the novel wraps up a little too neatly at the end, this is a highly recommendable novel from a creative and talented author.

--- Reviewed by Sarah Rachel Egelman

I love this author and really enjoyed this book about an unlikely couple battling individual demons. I have since read several of her works and recommend them as well.

Alba's crazy. Oscar's a druggie. Nevertheless, in spite of all their problems, perhaps because of all their problems, Alba and Oscar meet at the mental hospital and fall in love.

I like books about mental illness. I like books about redemption and healing. And I like books with a little romance in there somewhere. This book has all of these.

I actually picked this book up on a bargain table at Mr.Paperback.The 4.98 price sticker was covering the name of the book but I read the back cover and the picture was interesting. Ha ha I would of never picked the book up if I saw the title / but I am so glad I did. Was an interesting surprise that it was set in Maine. Was a good read and would recommend it just ignore the title :D

If you like Jodi Piccoult you'll probably like this author. Love in the Asylum weaves the past and present together to create a good story with a twist of intrigue as letters are found from a former asylum patient by a current patient.

The story traces the relationship between two patients one of whom has found letters from the past written in the backs of library books. The story bounces between all three characters and tells of their backgrounds and trials.

It's a quick read with enough twists to keep you interested and entertained. Some contest, naturally, was depressing, but the book keeps perspective and forward momentum.

It's not too light, but it's not overwhelmingly sad. The character of Oscar adds levity. I enjoyed the dialogue which doesn't get hung up on "he said, she said," and pushes the story along.

The use of asylum reports and patient information was a great way to document the details of the treatment and diagnosis of the patients. I found these a very interesting part of the novel.

There are a lot of interesting developments and the typical mental institution story is told in a fresh way.

"Love in the Asylum" is a story of hope. Hope for the "lost souls" of our world who, even at the very lowest points in their lives feel there must be something better; must be an answer to it all. These are the true survivors. Lisa Carey has defined her characters with such clarity it feels as though I know them myself. I would recommend this book to readers who are fascinated with the inner workings of the human mind.

I picked this book on a whim while I was out and fell in love with it. Carey's style is beautiful; her word use amazing. Yet, she doesn't circle around the point, but keeps it straight forward and flowing smoothly. I loved the interaction between Alba and Oscar and the interspersing of letters from "Mary," along with the hospital paperwork.

If you enjoyed Girl, Interrupted, this book is definitely worth looking into.

This is a LOVELY book. LOVELY. LOVELY. LOVELY. It felt different from other books b/c you are allowed inside the minds of the 2 main (and suffering) characters. You feel the sarcastic way they view their plights. You feel their hunger/frustration/desires. They belong to you. No need to go into all of the details of this beautiful story. Just know that it IS a beautiful story. A story of hope.

i wasn't expecting this book to be anything special. i'm drawn to books about psychiatric patients & obscure love stories. this was both. this was a random selection from the library & i'm looking forward to adding it to my collection in the future.

This is Lisa Carey's third novel, and the third one in a row I've now read. (One more to go.)

It's also the third one that has left me exasperated, because once again, she was blessed with a fabulous premise...and once again, the result was less than 'fabulous'.

So I guess I'm having to admit at this point that what I've been hoping from Ms Carey in terms of her writing potential bearing the sort of fruit that I've felt it should, just ain't gonna happen. Which, as harsh a critic as I may seem, leaves me pretty sad.

When a great storyteller tells a great tale, you get the sense that they have a commanding overview of it all. That is, their talent matches the task they've set out to accomplish. With 'Asylum', I felt all along there was a misalignment between Ms Carey's abilities and the breadth and depth of the premise. In other words, the wonderful potential is not matched with a corresponding quiver of abilities on her part. This misalignment was clear in how I felt once I'd finished the novel: disappointed.

'Asylum' has so much going for it. It's almost staggering to consider the elements, the scope of what Ms Carey bring into play. A person with bipolar whose past is filled with trauma. An addict with an equally harrowing history. A 'backstory' character bringing into play the notion of mood disorders and their treatment in the first half of the 20th century, women's rights, native history, spousal abuse, family dysfunction writ generational... Some unquestionably powerful stuff. And approached differently than these elements were...or by another writer entirely...what might have resulted could have been something particularly memorable.

Allow me to get to the specifics:

-I've come to realize that Ms Carey's authorial voice just doesn't work for me. Something is 'off', we're not simpatico, we just don't click as writer-reader. She doesn't entrance me, she doesn't engage me... I don't feel I'm being swept up in a great storytelling experience, being regaled to the fullest...I feel like I'm dutifully being brought up to date regarding a series of interconnected incidents.

-Once again, Ms Carey chose to have multiple narrator perspectives. I don't believe that this juggling added anything to the effort...in fact, I think it helped torpedo it. Especially as they all sounded so alike.

-The primary writer's credo is 'Show, don't tell'. But Ms. Carey's default seems to be the previously mentioned 'info-dump'. Often her exposition gives the impression of her wanting to get it out of the way and move onto something else. She's far more capable when dealing with human exchanges...although dialogue is definitely not her forté, either.

-The two lead characters really weren't given their due...but they fared better than the rest, who often came across as cardboard cutouts. But I did appreciate her representations of them insofar as how attraction and desire were experienced by two clearly emotionally handicapped adults (teenagers, really). It was authentic, and often had me smiling in agreement.

-Mary Doherty's tale...specifically the way in which it was told...was not well-served. Because of how it was presented, neither was the novel.

-The stylistic choice of no dialogue punctuation...leaving it 'blank'...has always seemed to me to be nothing more than pretentiousness. Its use here just entrenched this belief for me.

-I'm not sure whether this is a regionalism, whether it's a personal affectation on Ms Carey's part, but no matter: it's not 'metered', it's 'meted'.

-I highly doubt that a casual observer in 1939 would make a comment about a cockpit and its glassed-in state.

-The cover of the version I read...a painted represenation of a room...has to be one of the butt-ugliest I've ever encountered.

-And of course, I can't end off without tossing out my standard barb about 'the dearth of editorial oversight'. And to think, she had *two* editors working on this one.

Personal rating: 7/10