Amy Falls Down

A Novel

By: Jincy Willett

Narrated by: Amy McFadden

Audie Award Finalist, Literary Fiction, 2014

Amy Gallup is an aging novelist and writing instructor living in Escondido, California, with her dog, Alphonse. Since recent unsettling events, she has made some progress. While she still has writer's block, she doesn't suffer from it. She's still a hermit, but she has allowed some of her class members into her life. She is no longer numb, angry, and sardonic: she is merely numb and bemused, which is as close to happy as she plans to get. Amy is calm.

So, when on New Year's morning she shuffles out to her backyard garden to plant a Norfolk pine, she is wholly unprepared for what happens next. Amy falls down. A simple accident, as a result of which something happens, and then something else, and then a number of different things, all as unpredictable as an eight-ball break. At first the changes are small, but as these small events carom off one another, Amy's life changes in ways that range from ridiculous to frightening to profound. This most reluctant of adventurers is dragged and propelled by train, plane, and automobile through an outlandish series of antic media events on her way to becoming - to her horror - a kind of celebrity. And along the way, as the numbness begins to wear off, she comes up against something she has avoided all her life: her future, that "sleeping monster, not to be poked."

Amy Falls Down explores, through the experience of one character, the role that accident plays in all our lives. "You turn a corner and beasts break into arias, gunfire erupts, waking a hundred families, starting a hundred different conversations. You crack your head open and three thousand miles away a stranger with Asperger’s jump-starts your career." We are all like Amy. We are all wholly unprepared for what happens next. Also, there’s a basset hound.

©2013 Jincy Willett (P)2013 Brilliance Audio, Inc.

Hilarious and smart!

If you ever think about writing a story, you will enjoy it. I laughed out loud a few times.

Wonderful

Great writing, hilarious and profound, all highlighted by an exceptional performance. I will listen again!

All lovers of writing should love this

I love this book and I want to recommend it to everyone, especially those who are seriously wide-read, "bookish" people who have at least some familiarity with the literary scene, writers' workshops, and the angst of being an aspiring writer (or even a published one).

If this book puts you off because of the pink cover and all the people who have shelved it as "chick-lit" — ignore that nonsense. Jincy Willett only writes "chick-lit" if you think a book by a woman about a woman is by definition chick-lit. Amy Falls Down is "writer-lit."

You should also know that this book is a sequel to "The Writing Class," which is unfortunately not available on Audible. However, it's a sequel only in the sense that follows chronologically with the same main character. There are some references to the events in the previous book, but you don't have to read it first. Though you really should, because The Writing Class was also wonderful and the reason I discovered Jincy Willett.

Amy Gallup is a writer. A dumpy, sixty-something writer who had a brief moment when she was in her twenties, as a "writer to watch out for." She wrote several books that received critical acclaim but only modest sales, and then, for reasons that only slowly emerge in this book, reasons that she herself can't fully articulate, she stopped. She hasn't written much of anything for thirty years. When we first met her in The Writing Class, she was making a meager living teaching creative writing as adjunct faculty at a community college. That book was our introduction to Jincy Willett's scathing and hilarious (yet affectionate) send-up of the modern writing scene, and a cozy-ish murder mystery.

Then Willett comes along and writes Amy Falls Down, in which there is no murder, no mystery, and not even that much of a plot. Yet it's every bit as good as the first book — in fact, possibly better. It reads like something Willett wrote just because she felt like writing it. Which is perfectly congruent with her protagonist, Amy Gallup, who writes when she feels like it, which hasn't been for thirty years.

In the first chapter of this book, Amy falls down. And hits her head on a birdbath. Which gives her a concussion. By coincidence, she had an interview scheduled for that afternoon. A reporter, doing a story on "washed up writers - where are they now?" (not phrased quite that unkindly) was supposed to come to her house to talk to her. To her horror, Amy realizes that she gave the interview and can't even remember it. She goes to the hospital, meets a nice doctor who is, like apparently almost all doctors, a wannabe novelist himself, and then gets a call from her former agent, who informs her that she has suddenly generated "buzz" because of her interview.

As Amy suddenly finds herself attracting (unwanted) attention for the first time in years, she also finds herself writing stories again for the first time in years.

The story is ostensibly the resurrection of Amy's writing career, a resurrection she never dreamed about, cared about, or particularly wanted. Along the way, she attends writers' conferences, bookshop appearances, and radio talk shows in which, pushed once too often, she turns her rarely-deployed but devastating wit on a windbag host and generates more publicity for herself by taking him apart on the air.

You can also see thinly-disguised representations of prominent contemporary authors, bestsellers, in the fictitious authors Amy meets. I won't name names because Jincy Willett is a lot better-read than I am and probably was thinking of completely different names than the ones I thought she was satirizing, but the beauty of her characterization is that every one of these people is real, hilarious, sometimes likable and sometimes buffoonish, but no one is a cartoon. Much of the book is spent inside Amy's head and her interior monologue, which is maybe why people insist on calling this "chick lit" (it's not), but Amy's thought process is human and funny and real, and gives you a glimpse of what a real writer can do when writing about real people with messy, complicated lives even if they are, from the outside, perfectly mundane ones lacking any sort of novelistic drama and adventure.

I hesitate to identify Amy as an author stand-in, even though the similarities between her and her author are too obvious to be ignored. Because I can picture Jincy Willett reading my review and letting out an exasperated sigh about readers who think they're smarter than they are. Not that she'd say anything, because like Amy Gallup, I imagine that Jincy Willett may find people exasperating and annoying, but she doesn't have the cruel streak necessary to actively mock them even if they deserve it.

Since I listened to Amy Falls Down on audio, I can't easily type all the quotable passages I want to fill this review with. Just take my word for it that there is lots of quote material. Willett writes with wit and humor and warmth and sometimes just enough of a sharp edge to let you know that, like Amy, she could really cut you down if she wanted to. But she won't, because she's too nice.

The subplot, with some members of her writing class from the previous book setting up an "authors' retreat," is almost incidental, and for much of the middle section of this book I thought Willett had dropped it completely. It gets wrapped up at the every end, with enough humor to justify its inclusion, but it seems like mostly a bone thrown to readers of the first book. It does, however, continue to skewer the foibles and pretensions of writer wannabes, writer gurus, writers' workshops, and the entire industry that has grown around those who fancy themselves enamored of "the writing life."

Too much fun

This is not normally my cup of tea. I'm sort of a military fiction/science-fiction/thriller/mystery kind of guy. I like a lot of action in my books and I don't like a lot of psychological mumbo-jumbo or romance or sex. Philosophy? OK. I can handle some of that, and there is plenty of philosophy found in this work. It's dished out in un-subtle slaps to the mug too, though not unkindly.

Plus, it's a very funny book, sort of in a "Stephanie Plum" funny way. However the protagonist, Amy, isn't young and fit and beautiful. She's in her 60s and sort of dumpy; and very anti-social, especially at the start of the book. When we meet her she has a basset hound and a couple of friends and teaches writing on-line and has a very messy house which she rarely leaves and which is filled with books she hasn't read.

In chapter one, she falls down. She's hit on the head and suffers a mild concussion.

What happens from there... Well, listen to the book. You'll enjoy it. I did, and I was surprised. Honestly I never would have bought this book but it was one of those books recommended by the narrators.

And, speaking of the narrator, Amy McFadden did a wonderful job on this book, catching the character's voices just right; hitting the proper ironic notes and also deadpanning the slapstick in the funniest ways. I laughed out loud while in inappropriate places, such as the grocery store, the pet store, the gas pump and one or two other public places I can't think of right now.

For me, this book was sort of like falling down and being hit on the head and suffering a mild concussion, metaphorically, and... I suppose... philosophically speaking.

This book is laugh out loud funny, I recommend it highly.

Enjoyable story

Very well written, funny in many parts, and had a good message. The story line kept me interested and it definitely had a "feel good" ending.

Not Chick Lit!!

A comedy, A life study, A culture study, A yummy study of words, phrases and life in a delightful humorous and very sarcastic tale of an aging writer/author. Amy McFadden did an excellent job with the voices and pace, I especially loved her voice for Maxine!! I loved this book!

A real 'pick me up' story

I didn't know what to expect when I started. It is comical, insightful, entertaining, and present realistic issues in a manner that doesn't bludgeon the reader. Aspiring writers may find some interesting tidbits in this as well. Other than the narrator sounding a little young to voice a 60 year old (hardly a complaint), I really enjoyed Amy McFadden's narration.

Utterly charming and effortlessly funny

Any additional comments?

There is really no other word for this book (and its predecessor, The Writing Class) than quirky. And not in some trite, throwaway manner. The books are peculiar and insightful, the main character (aging and sometimes creatively ailing writer, Amy Gallup) is insightful and singular in the best way. The book is not built for everyone - much like its protagonist, the personality and pacing, the meandering story and self-examination, will either click with you or leave you indifferent. For dedicated readers and aspiring writers, the story is a fun exploration of how the life you live populates the pages you read/write, and how the path to the page is often unglamorous and solitary, random and accidental. I hope Willett writes more about Amy, because her quirky personality is a pleasure to read.

Clever, funny & entertaining!

What did you like best about this story?

The sense of humor of the main character, and how it carried her through the trials and tribulations of her life.

Which character – as performed by Amy McFadden – was your favorite?

Amy, of course!

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

Laugh, a lot.

Any additional comments?

The narration was perfect.

Refreshing

Such a light and happy read, but still not fluff! Endearing and thoughtful. The characters are the kind of people you’d really like to have in your life.