She and I: A Fugue (Paperback)

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Editorial Reviews

Review

"... a unique blend: novels with comparable character interactions are common, but they're fictional, and thus fantastical. Conversely, memoirs are never as personal ... perhaps that's why I found She and I so emotionally gripping." - Bernie Horowitz * "I really don't cry easily, but this had me weeping." - Lindsay Woodcox * "A glimpse into a relationship's heart." - Susan Hymas * "... quite unusual, and quite gripping ... juicy and full of emotional events as he pursues love where it takes him ... he does not aim to titillate; rather he means to inspire." - John J. Enright * "Tonight I finished - tears falling, drying then welling up again. I feel grateful." - Kathleen Glass * "Rich, breathtaking ... each scene a story unto itself. Love the texture." - Stefanie Harvey * "Powerfully written ... very poetic ... poignant ... an amazing accomplishment." - Carol Fiore * "I couldn't put it down. I sat in my chair all night and read it all. It's inspired me to start writing - to chronicle some of the really good stuff of my life." - Chris Crawford --Preview reader reaction

A fugue is a musical term for a style of composition written in a fixed number of parts, or "voices." Here in Michael Brown's She and I: A Fugue, the author employs a multitude of lyrical techniques, such as line breaks, rhythm, and figurative speech, to create a memoir that reads like verse, but has all the narrative elements of creative nonfiction. The result is that each of his experiences is told in its own voice.

This is a memoir centered on one man's life experiences with women, beginning with his mother and grandmother and continuing to the romantic relationships of his adult life; each relationship has importance and significance, and he says in the early pages, "women were big presences. They raised me." Told in episodes of varying length, the memoir is divided into five parts, with each part further divided into chapters with their own segmented narratives. The writing, at the sentence level, is devoid of any unnecessary language, and sentences often omit articles, modifiers, and pronouns. In a simple description of a young girl nursing her fingers which had just been smashed in a window, the author says: "She had them to lips."

Additionally, Brown uses other poetic elements, such as line breaks and regular patterns of rhythm, to describe his experiences and breathe life into them. In chapter two, he writes: "A shock. / The lights grew brighter. / I stopped walking without realizing. / I did not move or breathe." Such stripped down syntax and the lyrical employment of speech makes for a complexly intricate composition which enhances the memoir's theme of moving away from convention and toward a unique life.

Of course, such stylized writing and poetic language may make the writing somewhat inaccessible for some readers; and at times, Brown seems to intentionally structure his narrative with abstractions and deviations from convention, and the reader may feel lost or left out of the story. However, such intricacy with language is ultimately artful and moving, and the effect of such lyrical writing will not be lost on most readers. This is a memoir that is able to draw from both poetic and narrative elements, blending language and metaphor with story into a tapestry that reads with the clarity of a story but with the lyricism of a poem. The effect is musical.

Four Stars out of Five. --ForeWord CLARION Reviews

An obsessive metaphysical Internet romance between May and December is loaded with long-distance yearning, self-actualization, Zen aphorisms and idiosyncratic punctuation. Beginning with his early memories of life as the child of a single mother in the mid-'60s and ending with a meditation on what he learned, She and I recounts the author's lifelong journey toward understanding himself in light of the Eternal Feminine. But his relatively chaste intimate history with various ladies, as described in this debut novel, reads more like George Bernard Shaw's Don Juan in Hell than the Marquis de Sade's Philosophy in the Bedroom, since there's much more talk than there is actual physical contact - especially with Mira, the 18-year-old ballet student the 35-year-old Brown meets online in 2000. The usual giddy rush of infatuation ensues, progressing steadily from e-mails and instant messages to long-distance phone calls to the ultimate challenge - face time. Brown travels from the West Coast to Boston and it's all music, fire and poetry when they meet. They see themselves in each other - and envision some sort of future together ... Literate and engaging in a low-key, contemplative way, the author's prose will appeal to romantics of a certain stripe and those who see great meaning in the smallest gesture or the word unspoken. For those who like their prose more substantial and standard in form, Brown's chat-room style of condensed syntax and inelegant contractions ("When her breathing'd gone regular, I turned. Again moon'd come - again I'd watch, think, drift.") may seem a bit precious. A slightly steamy philosophical tome for the online community. --Kirkus Discoveries

Product Description

A non-fiction memory piece, She and I: A Fugue focuses on a man's evolution through his contact with women. Starting in his infancy, a series of striking females change Brown's life dramatically - for better or worse. When his first marriage ends with his wife's death, Brown finds himself alone, thrown into a crisis of meaning.

In 2000, Brown joins a group of young intellectuals dispersed across the globe. When a teenage member of the group - an 18-year-old ballerina in Boston - writes him a letter, the two quickly become infatuated. It's a relationship that will alter Brown's life forever.

An unexpected journey into the male heart, She and I: A Fugue finds a new style, and a new view of the deep underground connection of man to woman.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 283 pages
• Publisher: Petrarca Press; First edition (May 1, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0982040210
• ISBN-13: 978-0982040218
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 6.1 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,646,297 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars An Unexpected Journey Into the Male Heart!, June 22, 2009

By	Viviane Crystal (New York, USA) - See all my reviews

A fugue is a musical pieced played with different voices, sometimes flowing together and sometimes showing significant dissonance or different threads or phases. Michael Brown's off-beat memoir begins when he is a boy sent to a military school, is the victim of sexual abuse by a classmate bully and finds a way to make those memories strengthen his life rather than destroy it - by facing it squarely rather than burying the horrific memories. His life then turns around as he becomes totally enamored of a writer with a passion for trains and then a long phase in which the works of Ayn Rand and her followers shape his living philosophy. Later he professes a break from Rand's philosophy, yet his journey from that moment seems to bear an uncanny resemblance to Rand's own controversial role in successful and failed relationship with the opposite sex. Michael narrates his discovery of women, including a passionate and free relationship with a wife who dies of cancer and then a relationship borne out of an evolving, free spirit type of internet communication. The dialogues occurring on the internet occur between Michael and a woman many years younger than he, Mira. But they also include his girlfriend Gabrielle, who is as enamored of Mira as Michael is.

Mira is a dancer suffering from depression until her relationship with Michael bears fruit in changing her inner flexibility and endurance for complex dance movements. The characters spend a lot of time apologizing in advance and being sure they aren't crossing boundaries or hurting each other. They claim this sensitivity increases the depth of their bond, but the effect on the reader is to create more questions than agreement with this lengthy, repetitive process before they actually meet in person. Other crises occur with families and friends, natural events that occur in everyone's lives and other events demonstrating how an Objectivist would break from Rand's original ideas or just show their all-too-human foibles and then attempt to deal with same.

Brown writes in a poetic prose style with broken lines, rhyme, metaphors and similes that are supposed to elicit epiphanies in one's own life. Sometimes it works well and other times it's like viewing abstract art that evokes different thoughts and feelings in every unique individual viewing it. Complexity, compassion, beauty, tension and eroticism fill these pages, sometimes literally and sometimes figuratively open for the reader's interpretation.

She and I: A Fugue will please a limited audience who can appreciate this artistic presentation that is definitely poetry and probably sparks more philosophical questions than it answers. Its romance again will touch those who are culturally open to appreciate a different form of communication that stretches all boundaries. You'll love it, hate it, resonate with it or be totally confused by it all - it's an enigma fore sure! Try it - you may find something new evolving within yourself as surely as its author lived and relished.

Interesting account, Michael R. Brown!

Reviewed by Viviane Crystal on June 22, 2009

7 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Gripping Tale with Original Outlook, July 19, 2009

By	John J. Enright "rhyme of the day" (Chicago, IL USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This is a memoir, especially focused on the arc of the author's love life. Or, as he writes:

"Follows apparently disparate lines of experience into a final sounding of nature, time, and the Female Principle."

That sounds rather dry, but the story is juicy and full of emotional events, as he pursues love where it takes him. I take the subtitle, "A Fugue," as referring to the name of the theme-and-variations musical piece. He feels recurring patterns in his story.

I don't want to offer much in the way of story spoilage, but perhaps it is safe to say that it offers explorations of grief, internet relationships, and even polyamory. Some of the key players are what the author calls "the Rand-touched" - people deeply influenced by Ayn Rand.

He has one stylistic quirk that took some getting used to for me. It looks like this:

"No girl'd ever made me feel that."

Thus does a "had" get reduced to an apostrophe and a "d". We do, often, talk like that. But we don't usually transcribe it like that. Perhaps it does make you feel that you are listening to speech, not reading the written word.

The writing is spare, teasing you to imagine the scenes as they glimmer past. To me it felt, at times, like a fairly fast road trip:

"We flashed along, by trees - one stand leafless, bare branches swept
against clouds - then copseful of pines - needley, solid, rich-green."

"Our hands found one another across divider and clasped."

I kept thinking of Emily Dickinson. I guess it's the love of evocative language, plus the inner yearning for bliss. Like Dickinson, he does not aim to titillate; rather he means to inspire, and inspire he does.

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A heartbreaking journey, eloquently written, July 17, 2009

By	Jaded Javelin - See all my reviews

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Candor hurts. This candor is never compromised. I feel enriched by having read this writer's words. Devour his book; rest assured you'll never regret it. You shared your pain generously and with no ulterior motives. You hope that your words may help people with their souls' yearnings and the eternal quest for love and 'coming home.' Your success rate may be just 5%, but that is a grand number and would prove to you that your efforts were not in vain.