LOVESONGS OF EMMANUEL TAGGART by Syr Ruus; a modernized, fleshed out J. Alfred Prufrock.

Lovesongs of Emmanuel Taggart, Syr Ruus

Breakwater Books (2009),  248 pages

Syr Ruus’s Lovesongs of Emmauel Taggart is an off-kilter but ultimately insightful novel that will have its ideal audience reflecting on or relating to its universal story. It stars a well-wrought character, Emmanuel “M” Taggart, whose antics, at times far-fetched but always endearingly human, speak to the universal quest for meaning in modern life. Emmanuel, like far too many of us, is a man boxed in by cubicles and shackled by bad ties and to-do lists that leave no run for play, or possibly even identity. At times that can send a man into moments of introspection, or, in M’s case, a full-on, sad-funny breakdown. This book is a spotlight on a mid-life crisis, done in a fresh, fun way. Taggart does it all: small-scale road trips, new relationships, unfounded infatuations with perfect strangers, mind-numbing introspection, and like so many men in a time of self-examination,he questions the choice of a perfectly good partner like M’s wife, Emily, or, as he more affectionately calls her, “little m.” To quote the book, they call each other “Em & Em. Big M and little m. M&m.” (Aww…)

Considering the caliber of her writing, and the hefty thematic material she handles insightfully, it is hard to believe this is a debut novel. The perk of Lovesongs being a debut is that it takes chances and stretches the bounds of literary fiction in ways that all too often only a first novel dares do. Lovesongs is a well-written little gem, in a style all Ruus’s, that evokes all the senses, at times putting the reader in the character’s body, let alone his head. It’s a compelling, contemporary, and punchy style, without being trendy. It’s catchy and readable. It’s funny. It’s serious. Replete with much life wisdom that isn’t overly heavy-handed or opinionated, just deft and true, and is only occasionally out of context.

It is perfectly normal but tragically human to question your life from time to time, and in the case of Lovesongs of Emmanuel Taggart, it certainly makes for a good book, especially when the writer is one like Ruus, and the main character is a certified hypochondriac with more worries than problems. Syr Ruus plays with the big questions of life in this book, in a way that feels like she has the answers, but holds them back from her fumbling lead character, so that he has to come to the book’s fine closing revelation all his own, as we all do. We can’t change the world, Emmanuel Taggart, but we can change the way we look at it.

The title, by the way, is an homage to T.S Eliot’s epic and much anthologized 1915 poem, “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.”  click here to read it.)

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