How the Hula Girl Sings (Paperback)

~ (Author)
Key Phrases: Junior Breen, Luce Lemay, Earl Peet (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Luce Lemay returns to his hometown in Illinois after serving time for accidentally running down a young mother's infant daughter, but hope turns to tragedy in Meno's (Tender as Hellfire) moving second novel. Lemay is a poetic ex-con who often waxes lyrical about his remorse for his crime as well as the tragic character flaws of his equally romantic best friend from the joint, a troubled giant named Junior Breen. Lemay is also a hard worker who wants to make good, though, and events take a positive turn when he gets a job at a local gas station and meets beautiful young Charlene Dulaire, a waitress at a diner. Their romance sours when Dulaire's ex-fianc‚, a brute named Earl Peet, attacks Lemay and threatens to run him out of town. Meno pens some wonderful scenes of courtship and setbacks in the course of love, and he also does some nice work bringing Breen to life and exploring his friendship with Lemay. The tragic confrontation between convicts and townies is somewhat predictable, but Meno gets considerable mileage from the give and take among Lemay's elderly boss and the two young ex-cons as they care for one another and try to overcome their earlier mistakes. Meno has a poet's feel for small-town details, life in the joint and the trials an ex-con faces, and he's a natural storyteller with a talent for characterization. The novel has some mawkish moments and certainly many disturbing ones, but overall it's a likable winner that should bolster Meno's reputation. National advertising; Midwest author appearances.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

Ex-con Luce Lemay, haunted by the crime he committed, returns to his hometown in rural Illinois to serve out his parole. Working as a gas station attendant with a fellow former inmate, he starts to forge a new life as he begins to court the tart-tongued waitress at the local diner. The locals, however, are reluctant to let him move on, and Lemay soon finds himself fending off attacks from jealous husbands, jilted fiances, and a particularly vengeful ex-con. As Lemay struggles to find redemption through his interactions with his grief-stricken landlady and a young abused boy, he finds himself inexorably drawn into the world of violence he sought to escape. Indeed, the characters seem to spend the majority of their time spitting out bloody teeth or attacking each other with tire irons. Yet Meno's poetic and visceral style perfectly captures the seedy locale, and he finds the sadness behind violence and the anger behind revenge. Fans of hard-boiled pulp fiction will particularly enjoy this novel. Brendan Dowling
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 209 pages
• Publisher: Akashic Books; 2nd edition (September 1, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1888451831
• ISBN-13: 978-1888451832
• Product Dimensions: 7.3 x 5.3 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #403,330 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A great surprise!, November 7, 2001

By	Sam "a reader" (Boston, MA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: How the Hula Girl Sings: A Novel (Hardcover)

This book was quite a surprise to me.
In college I became deeply infatuated with a
certain style of writing—that of such Southern
writers as William Faulkner, Flannery
O'Conner and especially Carson McCullers.
Joe Meno carries on this great Southern gothic
tradition in his new book How the Hula Girl
Sings.
Meno creates a claustrophobic
small town seething with sickness
and hate. He fills it with characters such as
an abusive father whose feet were eaten by
gangrene, a woman who kills small animals
and nails them to her walls in hand-crocheted
sweaters so that she can mourn them, and a
back stabbing ex-con who fashioned his fake
teeth out of gravel.
While this book is not a traditional
mystery I believe that it is well worth the read.
The story moves along at a good pace and is
extremely engaging. (The Librarian, 5 cats)

4.0 out of 5 stars Lyrical, Poetic Neo-Noir, October 8, 2005

By	David Benz (Mesa, AZ) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

HTHGS is a lyrical, poetic chronicle of a recently paroled felon's return to small town America. Mr. Meno writes with a dark, terse voice which captures the reader's attention. This trip inside a off-kilter, violent and sometimes insane world left me wanting more. A pure and thoughtful exploration of guilt and love in a world with little room for either.

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars You should really read this book, November 1, 2001

By	James (Los Angelas, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: How the Hula Girl Sings: A Novel (Hardcover)

What can I say? This is just an excellent read. Meno combines the quick, tight story movement of a pulp novel with a poet's view of the world. The language is simple but moving. Combine all that with some solid, fascinating, very human characters, finish it up with a powerhouse ending and you know what you got? One hell of a book.