In his latest book, Exley, Brock Clarke tells of young Miller Le Ray’s quest to find out what happened to his father, who walked out on the boy and his mother some time earlier. Miller’s father’s favorite book is A Fan’s Notes, a “fictional memoir,” written by Frederick Exley in the late sixties. The father’s love of the book seems quite obsessive: he owns multiple copies which he keeps stashed in various places so that he can always have one available and he frequently applies quotes from the book to various situations. The choice of the book as a guidebook for life is an odd one, as the book is filled with vulgar sexual references, misogyny, homophobia, and alcohol abuse. In fact at his mother’s behest, Miller’s father has instructed him not to read the book, but it is immediately apparent that the boy has not obeyed this instruction. He seems just as obsessed with the book as his father, perhaps more so, quoting from it himself, and adopting some of the books idiosyncrasies, such as replacing the names of people with their initial, and blanking out dates.
The story alternates between two equally unreliable narrators. The first is Miller himself. As a young boy of about 9 or 10, Miller’s account of events is limited by his understanding of the world, but it also seems to be affected by the trauma of his father’s departure, as well as by his obsession with Exley’s book. Miller believes that his father has gone to fight in Iraq, something his mother insists is not true. Miller will not give up this belief, leading his mother to seek the help of the second narrator, a psychiatric therapist who Miller has christened Dr. Pahnee. In A Fan’s Notes, Dr. Pahnee is the name of an alter-ego employed by Exley while picking up women in bars, and the name itself is a phonetic spelling of the French word for the male member. The name seems somewhat appropriate, as Dr. Pahnee seems more interested in wooing the boy’s mother than with professional ethics or the boy’s well-being. In fact, his behavior throughout the book is unprofessional and unethical: he breaks confidences: he spies on Miller, he spies on Miller’s mother, he interrogates Miller’s friends, he even breaks into Miller’s house.
Shortly after starting his sessions, Miller comes to believe that his father is back from Iraq. A trip to the Veteran’s Administration Hospital leads him to an encounter with a man he believes is his father. The man has suffered a serious brain injury and is lying in a coma. Miller decides that if he can find Frederick Exley, and bring him to his father's hospital bedside, he will wake up and get better. Miller’s quest is futile, because Exley died in 1992. However, between Miller’s search for Exley, and Dr. Pahnee’s obsession with curing the boy and thus winning the love of the boy’s mother, we gradually learn what really happened with his father.
Like Brock's other book, The Arsonist's Guide to Writers' Homes in New England (click the link for my review), this book is at the same time both comedic and tragic. Dr. Pahnee's unprofessional behavior is hilariously infuriating, but still manages for the most part to bring about the desired result. Miller's precocious absorption with Exley's book is amusing, but watching the boy struggle with the pain of missing his father is heart-wrenching. Miller's mother seems lost and unwilling to admit to her role in her family's situation, choosing rather to shift responsibility for helping Miller cope to the questionable skills of Dr. Pahnee.
Overall, I thought it was a good book, although I think I liked both Clarke's debut novel and Exley's "memoir" a bit better.
