A Quiet Life by Ethan Joella. Narrated by Stacey Glemboski, Melissa Redmond and Byron Wagner. Simon and Schuster Audio, 2022. 9 hours (approx.).
Ethan Joella’s A Quiet Life follows the lives of three persons who’ve experienced a loss. Chuck Ayers’ wife, Cat, died of cancer. Kirsten Bonato grieves her murdered father. Ella Burke waits for news on her missing daughter, Riley.
The book goes right for the heart as the opening images for each of these characters are immediate and wrenching. This one is worth quoting at length:
Instinctively, Chuck lights the small ceramic Christmas tree and switches on the front porch light. He looks out the window and notices all the other houses. He imagines good smells of dinner, random sounds of family: someone calling up the steps, the surge of a dishwasher running, dice from a board game, wine glasses clinking.
These specific details and appeals to sensory perception paint a vivid picture. Indeed, the reader both hears and sees the clinking glasses. It also contrasts with Chuck’s own dark, quiet house, and, since this picture is only in Chuck’s imagination, the state of his mind is obvious: he’s lonely and depressed.
Ella’s opening is also effective. Although her arm hurts, she scrapes the ice off her windshield “because it feels like she has found Riley and she is breaking through the ice to get her.” It’s a moving metaphor.
Kirsten’s story is the least interesting - to begin with, anyway. Much of it deals with the love triangle she’s caught in. The murder of her father, meanwhile, is pushed into the background. But, her character arc has a strong finish.
Ella’s arc has the reverse problem. While her story has all the excitement of a crime drama through the beginning and middle, the ending falls flat. She never confronts her daughter’s kidnapper, which is her estranged husband, Kyle. Her conflict is resolved by the police. Contrast this with the other protagonists. Chuck and Kirsten must confront someone (or something) they don’t want to confront in order to put their grief behind them. Ella just has to wait.
Kyle’s motivations are also disappointing. He wants to live with his new girlfriend out of state but cannot leave his daughter behind. So, he kidnaps her. Seems irrational and, indeed, a detective says as much but then handwaves it away. A better motivation: Kyle was so abused by the family court system - a system notoriously weighted against fathers - that he acted out of desperation, out of fear that he’d never see Riley again. This scenario also would have provided a point for the villain, and the best villains are the ones who have a point.
All three lives eventually intersect. A major lynch pin is Cat Ayers. She never appears in the story outside of others’ memories. Nevertheless, her advice plays a critical role: “Be someone’s cardinal.” Cardinals, she explains, stay with us even through the winter. The metaphor is clear: be a friend during the rough times. Kirsten best exemplifies this when she decides to accompany Chuck on his life-altering confrontation.
If you are a writer, A Quiet Life follows the Save the Cat beats. Opening images have already been discussed. It also has a theme stated by a supporting character (Cat’s cardinals), a midpoint turn and a (largely) satisfying resolution.
To use Chuck as an example, his midpoint turn happens when he decides to adopt a pet pig. Giddy with the idea, he nearly breaks out of his depression. Alas, the pig is adopted by another family leaving Chuck sad again. His grief is finally put behind him in the resolution.
Not all midpoints need to be false victories. They can be false defeats as well. Kirsten is having a good time with David but feelings for another man complicates her life.
A Quiet Life is a great novel. Joella’s ability to quickly elicit emotion from the reader and create empathy for his characters is unsurpassed with the exception of Crawford’s The Witch of Prague. The problems with the character arcs are minor blemishes. So, too, is the present tense in which Joella writes.