Wayward Saints [Hardcover]

Suzzy Roche (Author)

Book Description

Release date: January 17, 2012

From a folk-rock legend comes a tender, comic story of family, music, and second chances.

"Wayward Saints is funny, smart, poignant, the prose so clear, so direct, so true. This book is a joy."
--Jane Hamilton, author of The Book of Ruth and A Map of the World

Mary Saint, the rule-breaking, troubled former lead singer of the almost-famous band Sliced Ham, has pretty much given up on music after the trauma of her band member and lover Garbagio's death seven years earlier. Instead, with the help of her best friend, Thaddeus, she is trying to piece her life together while making mochaccinos in San Francisco. Meanwhile, back in her hometown of Swallow, New York, her mother, Jean Saint, struggles with her own ghosts.

When Mary is invited to give a concert at her old high school, Jean is thrilled, though she's worried about what Father Benedict and her neighbors will think of songs such as "Sewer Flower" and "You're a Pig." But she soon realizes that there are going to be bigger problems when the whole town--including a discouraged teacher and a baker who's anything but sweet--gets in on the act.

Filled with characters that are wild and original, yet still familiar and warm--plus plenty of great insider winks at the music industry--Wayward Saints is a touching and hilarious look at confronting your past and going home again.

Praise for Wayward Saints

"Wayward Saints is full of wonderful observations about family, fame, guilt, aging, the stupid music business, and the power and glory of performing and creating. Most importantly, Suzzy Roche has written a book about love and redemption. And it's funny! I loved the little details and the big surprises."
--Loudon Wainwright, Grammy-winning songwriter

"[Roche's] language is dazzling--unpredictable, supremely funny, irreverent, and full of authority. Wayward Saints is the best and most surprising debut novel I've read since I can't remember when."
--Rosellen Brown, author of Half a Heart and Before and After

"If you've ever had the privilege of hearing Suzzy Roche sing, you know all about her perfect pitch, her angel's voice, her subtle wit. Her masterful debut novel, Wayward Saints, mines these same prodigious gifts. When Mary Saint, a once-promising indie rocker, is invited to perform in her hometown, where her mother, Jean, still holds court, the two are forced into a long-deferred reckoning: with each other and with the demons of their past. This is a golden-threaded tale of redemption, of the transformative powers of art, and of the mysteries, pains, and sacrifices of love."
--Deborah Copaken Kogan, author of Hell Is Other Parents and The Red Book

"Spoiler alert: this book is wonderful from beginning to end. I loved every page."
--Patricia Marx, author of Starting from Happy

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Suzzy Roche was one-third of the female vocal folk-rock group from New Jersey known as the Roches. With their lovely harmonies and quirky lyrics, their music was, much like this first novel, idiosyncratic and uniquely humorous. The story fluctuates in time and place, from Glasgow and upstate New York to Nashville and San Francisco as Roche turns her experiences as a musician into fodder for fiction. Mary Saint is a former lead singer of a defunct indie band with the unlikely name of Sliced Ham and a penchant for odd song titles (“Sewer Flower” and “You’re a Pig”). After the death of a fellow band member and lover, she decides to leave the music world. The other main character is Mary’s mother, Jean Saint, who has her own set of troubles. Roche pokes fun at the music business in ways that only a true insider can while offering insights into family, faith, and the past. Fans of the Roches will enjoy this tale, as will any reader who values a well-turned phrase or a story well told. --June Sawyers

About the Author

Along with her sisters, Maggie and Terre, Suzzy Roche is a founding member of the beloved singing group The Roches, whose debut recording was named Album of the Year by the New York Times in 1979. She has been touring for over 30 years, appeared on SNL, The Letterman Show, and the Tonight Show with Jay Leno. The Roches have collaborated with Paul Simon, The Indigo Girls, Philip Glass, and Laurie Anderson. She recently teamed up with Meg Wolitzer to co-host "A Love Affair Between Words and Music" for WNYC at Symphony Space in New York, and is the creator of 'Zero Church," a performance piece that has been performed all over the United States. In 2013, her first children's book will be published by Random House.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 272 pages
• Publisher: Voice; First edition (January 17, 2012)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1401341772
• ISBN-13: 978-1401341770
• Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 0.9 x 8.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,047,609 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars completely engrossing - what can this woman NOT do? January 17, 2012

By George DeMark

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

Here's a confession: i grew up listening to the Roche Sisters. They were so charming, and kind of haunting too - just beautiful. But that's neither here or there. Well, I suppose it IS important since when i heard suzzy roche had written her first novel, and that it was amazing (a few rumor-mongers told me that) that I knew I had to read it.

Well, guess what? Sometimes people are right! Wayward Saints is one of those incredible debuts that just leaves you scratching your head and wondering about how fair the world is - after all, Suzzy Roche is a wonderful singer and, it turns out, a wonderful WRITER, too. How fair is that that one person can do two things better than 99 percent of the population? (The answer is that it is not fair). Wayward Saints is about a woman, a musician, who returns to her hometown where she has to confront the ghosts of her past, and one really big human being, her mother. The novel is as delicate as a Roche Sisters harmony, but also funny and wise and totally satisfying. Maybe I shouldn't be surprised that this woman can write, and tell a story, this well. Maybe an artist is an artist. But I know this for sure - that Wayward Saints is one of those novels that you will be unable to get out of your head, and in that way it is like a Roche Sisters song. And I say this as someone who doesn't always naturally connect to mother-daughter dramas. But Suzzy Roche is the real deal - a great musician who is also a first-rate writer.

In short, read this book. I hear the author is doing a mini book tour - singing as well as reading from her novel (she is not singing her novel - those are two different things). If i can, I want to show up at one. The book - and Suzzy - are THAT good.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Love, Spirituality, Loss and Redemption January 17, 2012

By Bonnie Brody TOP 100 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover

Wayward Saints by Suzzy Roche is a novel about love, spirituality, loss and redemption. It tells the story of singer Mary Saint who once was in an alternative rock/grunge band called Sliced Ham. After the tragic death of her lover and band member, Garbagio, the band does not perform again. When the novel opens, it is seven years after Garbagio's death and Mary has not picked up a guitar in that whole time.

Mary comes from a small town named Swallow in upstate New York. An English teacher from the local high school approaches Mary's mother, Jean, with the idea of Mary performing in the local high school - the very same one that Mary attended. When Jean asks Mary about performing, Mary says yes, as much to her own surprise as to her mother's. Mary and her mother have a complicated relationship. It is loving but there is a lot of baggage. For years, Mary's father, who is now in a nursing home due to a stroke, abused the both of them physically. Mary can't figure out why her mother didn't leave him. Due to the extent of the abuse, Mary left home at sixteen, angry and despondent but filled with hope to make something of herself.

Mary is now living in San Francisco with her friend Thaddeus, a `chocolate tranny'. Mary met Thaddeus in her church when he was homeless and offered him a place to stay in her apartment rent free. Mary's heart is big and bold and she holds nothing back. Her songs are like that as well - fierce, strident, loving, independent, and not of the mainstream.

Jean is a religious catholic and is concerned about Mary's upcoming performance. She herself is unable to listen to Mary's music because of the lyrics and the dystonic flavor of the songs. Some of the titles are `You're a Pig' and `Sewer Flower'. Jean worries about what the regular folks of Swallow will think of Mary, especially the local priest. How will Mary's performance reflect on Jean?

The author of this novel, Suzzy Roche, was once in a band with her sisters. It was called The Roches and, to be quite honest, I had never heard of it before I read information about the author. This band, like the one in the novel, was alternative and not in the mainstream. It had its own following and still does till this day.

This is a debut novel and has many of the problems that come with first novels - incomplete characterization, repetitiveness, and thematic issues. The focus on spirituality seems to be a priority but it is never fleshed out enough to give it real form. Some of the writing is very poetic and reads like song lyrics which are quite beautiful. However, this is not enough to give the book the cohesiveness that is missing. Ms. Roche has a definite talent and I look forward to her future writings.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Wayward Saints January 31, 2012

By Texas Book Lover

Format:Hardcover

By Suzzy Roche
Hyperion, 259 pgs
978-1-4013-4177-0
Rating: 3

(Aside: This book was shipped to me with Wayward Saints as the addressee, causing my stepmother and sister to inquire as to whether I'd joined a cult.)

Saint is the surname of the principle characters in Wayward Saints: Bub, Jean and Mary. Bub and Mary are definitely wayward, while Jean is just painfully inhibited and scared witless. They live in a small town called Swallow which is painted as a stultifying cliche of a hide-bound neo-con backwater. Bub was frequently unemployed and fond of knocking around his wife and daughter. Jean was thoroughly cowed and unable to protect her daughter. Mary, understandably, became a teenager full of rage directed at everyone and everything, eventually high-tailing it out of Swallow at seventeen. Who could blame her? Not me.

Mary went on to form a very successful "alternative" band called Sliced Ham. She found a socially acceptable way to misbehave: rock star. And she lived up to the reputation, forced into rehab after a tragedy, both professional and personal. Mary leaves rehab to find a disbanded band, her manager drops her, royalties are drying up, so she aimlessly withdraws from the planet. Mary's redemption and resurrection happen, of course, in Swallow, where she agrees to play a concert for the high school. She has not set foot in Swallow since she was seventeen, nor has she seen her mother or father. So we come full circle.

My favorite character was Jean Saint, Mary's mother. She began this tale as a beaten and abused mother and wife, always trying to placate a husband who couldn't be. She was bound by convention, scared of the "shoulds," frankly she got on my nerves. Although some of the titles of Mary's songs, such as "Sewer Flower," are not something I would want to discuss with my grandmother. But never mind. As Mary must journey, methodically re-entering the world, Jean is on her own journey but she's on rollerblades. She transforms herself, becoming a smart, independent, funny woman and is such a joy by the end of the book. I love her.

I wish I loved this book. The characters are well-drawn and the story heartfelt. There are a few too many cliches. The plot sort of meanders around, decorated by specimens as opposed to people. There are no "regular" (cannot for the life of me come up with a better term) people outside Swallow, they are all trying too hard to be strange. I was not invested in this one. It's a nice little book, nothing much really wrong with it. I do want to say that Suzzy Roche has potential. I will gladly take a look at her next work. I expect it will be much improved. However, I cannot recommend a book if it doesn't elicit more enthusiasm than this. What would be the point of reading?

Suzzy Roche is a founding member (with her sisters) of the Roches, a best-selling folk band whose first album was named Album of the Year by the New York Times in 1979.

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