July 03, 2004
A Gracious Plenty by Sheri Reynolds

A Gracious Plenty by Sheri Reynolds: a novel that examines the relationships between people, both those that are living and those that are dead.

Finch Noble is a cemetary caretaker that has no real friends except for the dead. Burned and left disfigured in a horrible accident as a child, Finch has been shunned by most of the town and is content to care for the cemetary and talk to the dead, her parents among them. All this begins to change, however, when she follows the request of her best friend, Lucy, a stripper who committed suicide.

Lucy’s mother cannot believe that her beautiful daughter, once a beauty queen and pageant winner, would ever kill herself and refuses to believe Finch when she tells her that her daughter wasn’t murdered. Filing harassment charges against Finch leads her to becoming close to Leonard, a policeman who’s been nothing but a failure to his father. As the two worlds interact with each other through Finch, the tension builds and results in a climax that reveals hidden secrets.

In a way, this novel was more about the people and how they deal with both their lives and deaths more than moving towards a plot resolution, though one was given. I enjoyed getting to know Finch, Lucy, and Leonard and enjoyed Reynold’s style. An enjoyable, quick read.