In this entertaining and moving
novel, an author returns to his hometown of Bush Falls, Connecticut after an
absence of 17 years.  To set up the story, narrator Joe Goffman explains how he
left town after high school and eventually wrote a novel ridiculing most of the
people in the small town, including the high school basketball coach and many
of the boys on the team.  The book, "Bush Falls," became a bestseller
and had a major Hollywood movie made out of it, making Joe rich.  It was
categorized as fiction, but everyone from the town could recognize themselves
in the plot.  Just about everyone in town now hates him.  This makes his return
especially interesting. 

Joe’s father has had a stroke, and
so Joe stays in his father’s house while visiting.  His brother Brad views him
suspiciously, and Brad’s wife Cindy is distinctly cold towards Joe.  He only
has to set foot inside of the local diner for the coach’s wife to throw her milkshake
over him.  Other people make threats on his life.  Yet there are some people who
welcome him back; especially his old best friend Wayne, who is seriously ill. 

Tropper writes well, making Joe a
wise-cracking eloquent and unhappy author.  The story swings rapidly from high
drama to humor, occasionally mixing the two.  The book starts with him telling
of the time when he was 13 and walked in on his older brother getting a blowjob
from the cheerleader Cindy.   It isn’t long before he reveals that soon before
this awkward encounter, his manic-depressive mother committed suicide by
throwing herself into Bush Falls.  In the first half of the book, Goffman
switches chapters between the present and his senior high school year in 1986. 

The Book of Joe gives the
impression that Tropper is hoping that someone will make a movie of it,
especially with its bittersweet cinematic ending and plenty of rather
melodramatic moments.  While Goffman is a determinedly irreverent commentator
on life, his heart is in the right place. He is a lonely man looking for true
love, and the book plays it safe in never really leaving much doubt as to
whether he will ever find it.  The gruff but popular character of the coach and
the theme of high school basketball games feel chosen for their dramatic
effect.  These flaws mean that this book does not rival the wonderfully
detailed depiction of small town New England life by Richard Russo, for
example.  However, Tropper’s writing is fluid and engaging, and he carries off
the story with conviction. 

Scott Bick’s performance of the
book on the 9 CD version from Books on Tape is excellent.  He does a
great job at capturing Joe Goffman’s injured irony. 

© 2006 Christian Perring. All
rights reserved.