A surprisingly touching, and at times tender, tale of a man haunted by his choices.
A successful novelist by any account, Charlie Forte is putting the finishing touches on his magnum opus. Only this story will transcend the written word. This is the story Charlie. His conquests, his insecurities, his missed opportunities, his successes. “No matter how glorious the circumstance, Charlie was never satisfied—be it a house, or a wife, or other female companionship.” The pages detail this ideology in great detail and with no small amount of cynicism and wit. As in all his endeavors, Charlie’s plans to finish his novel and finish himself take a shambolic turn. The story turns into a surprisingly coherent cluster of memories, some consequential, others jejune, culminating in an ending that even Charlie couldn’t have penned.
The Music of Women by Vincent Panettiere diverges from any expected clichés and features a story about an insecure man coming to terms with his inadequacies. Garrulous and slick, contemptuous and self-loathing, Charlie’s character is the amalgamation of so many boyhood fantasies muddled with a healthy dose of narcissism and arrogance. The vulnerability Panettiere paints Charlie with makes the character someone to simultaneously love and hate. The book drifts into a metaphysical realm, but isn’t bogged down with such abstract ideas so as to spoil the arc of the story. Personally, I felt like the ending was a bit soft, but it tempers the book and makes it approachable to a broader audience.
The Music of Women is a surprisingly touching, and at times tender, tale of a man haunted by his choices, chased by his demons and obsessed with the breast. Both unexpected and humorous in a self-effacing manner, Vincent Panettiere has crafted a novel that is satisfyingly piquant.
