Buddy Cooper Finds a Way

Informationen zum Autor Neil O’Boyle Connelly, well-acquainted with losing from his days as a high school wrestler in Allentown, Pennsylvania, teaches fiction in the M.F.A. program at McNeese State University in Lake Charles, Louisiana. Klappentext When you lose for a living, it's pretty hard to fail.Once, like all of us, Buddy dreamt of success. He and his wife, Alix, had just bought a new place, not too far from the beach. Their daughter, Brook, was out of the hospital. And the fans were cheering him on as the Invincible Man, one of the rising stars of the Southeastern Wrestling Confederacy.Then everything fell apart. An argument over Monday Night Football somehow crossed the line, Alix kicked him out, and Buddy moved in to the Motel 6. After that, winning just didn't seem right, so he traded in his golden cape for a latex mask and became one of the anonymous losers that fans love to hate. Every few weeks, he'd get a new mask, rechristen himself, and step into the ring to get beat all over again -- as the Grave Digger or the Widow Maker, the Deadbeat Dad or the Unknown Kentucky Terror. In the four years since the divorce, his record is 0-186, but that's okay by Buddy.Free of mad notions like happiness and success, he pops pink pills to control his rage and copes with his insomnia by watching John Wayne westerns and QVC. He has his job, his apartment, his truck, his once-a-week visits with Brook. Life as a failure isn't that bad, or so he's convinced himself.But now in an effort to boost pay-per-view ratings, Buddy's boss threatens a shake-up. As part of the plan, Buddy will have to end his safe days as a professional loser. He's actually slated to win a match. What he'll learn, though, is that like all new scripts, this one comes with its own cast and complications: a phone psychic living in fear, an alien-abductee with the secret to salvation, a championship match interrupted by a violent fanatic, what could be faith healings, and perhaps the most unlikely miracle of all -- a second chance to believe.A touching and wonderfully unpredictable literary debut about a professional loser who's forced into a rematch with life, Buddy Cooper Finds a Way announces the arrival of a fresh and original voice in American fiction. Chapter The First In Which Our Hero Attempts to Return Home. Trophies and Medals. A Perfect Record. The Therapeutic Value of Giving Up. Churches Without Roofs. Wishing for a Script. Just as I'm nearing the turn that will lead to safety, the second moon appears before me, hung low over the Cape Fear River at the end of Market Street. I pretend I don't see it, look left, and steer my Ford into the alley. Up ahead I can make out the yellow light on my deck, and I'm almost bold enough to hope for the impossible: Today's plan might work. A crackling A.M. voice from WAOK reports that the evening will be clear, mild temperatures, no rain -- news I instantly take as omen. This will end up as just one more fine day in a life that's fine. On the seat next to me sits a box of Domino's pizza and two rented videos: The Green Berets and True Grit. From here on out, the plan is simple: get up off the street, bolt the door, unplug the phone, forget the moon, and spend the night in a world where things make sense. It won't be like last year. I pull to the side of the alley, kill the headlights, and turn the key, bringing silence and calm. I loop the strap of my gym bag over my shoulder and grab the pizza and flicks. From the floor I pick up the final element for tonight's mission -- a two-liter bottle of ginger ale, which doesn't remind me at all of champagne or the tink of forks off glasses. This morning I dumped a six-pack of Bud Light into my kitchen sink, transforming my apartment into the alcohol-free zone it's supposed to be these days. Taking the steps that lead up to my apartment's deck one at a time, I envision the comfort of the brown couch, t...

About the author

Neil O’Boyle Connelly, well-acquainted with losing from his days as a high school wrestler in Allentown, Pennsylvania, teaches fiction in the M.F.A. program at McNeese State University in Lake Charles, Louisiana.

Product details

• Authors: Neil O. Connelly, Neil O'Boyle Connelly
• Publisher: External catalogues UK
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Released: 16.03.2010
• EAN: 9780743274166
• ISBN: 978-0-7432-7416-6
• Subjects: Fiction > Narrative literature; Modern & contemporary fiction (post c 1945), FICTION / Literary, FICTION / Family Life / Marriage & Divorce, Modern and contemporary fiction: general and literary