Joyful

by Robert Hillman

She was waiting in the centre of the room when Leon entered. Hands on her hips, left leg forward, right hip raised. Her lips were bare.

Leon closed his eyes for two or three seconds. When he opened them and saw Tess again, the world was gone. The dress she wore - and it was obvious that she understood this - was one of the two or three that she would wear flawlessly in her lifetime. Leon sat on the chair by the shoe cupboards and let the tears fall down his cheeks. Tess knew not to move, but she smiled.

Leon Joyce's great love for his wife Tess had nothing to do with 'vulgar sex' and everything to do with beauty. Tess, who very much enjoyed vulgar sex, looked elsewhere for her pleasure.

Now she is dead and Leon has stumbled on the details of her last infatuation. He retreats to his country property, Joyful, demented with grief and jealousy, and forms a bizarre plan to retrieve (posthumously) his wife’s devotion.

Genres: Ebooks

345 pages, Paperback

First published April 23, 2014

About the author

Robert Hillman is a Melbourne-based writer of fiction and biography. His autobiography THE BOY IN THE GREEN SUIT won the Australian National Biography Award for 2005. His critically acclaimed MY LIFE AS A TRAITOR (written with Zarha Ghahramani) was shortlisted for the Prime Minister’s Literary Award for Non-Fiction in 2008 and was published widely overseas.
After many years of teaching in high schools and university, Robert Hillman now works as a full-time writer. He has three children and lives in Warburton, in Victoria's Yarra Valley.

Reviews

[Chris Waterford · Rating 3 out of 5]

A crazy story with crazy (literally) characters. A study of the impact of extreme grief on two different men. Frustrating at times, and confronting at times, it was well written enough to hang in with the dysfunctional narrative.

[Marianne · Rating 4 out of 5]

Joyful is the sixth novel by Australian author, Robert Hillman. Joyful is a property at Yackandandah in country Victoria that was inherited by Leon Joyce; it was built by his great grandfather, used by his great aunt as a base for a Socialist Christian community, and offered by his wife to her friends as a temporary retreat, but Leon has never been there. Leon is a strange little man: a somewhat overweight rare-book seller who is obsessed with female beauty, but in a completely asexual way. Tess Wachowicz is a beautiful musician and radio presenter who is decidedly promiscuous. But when Leon dresses Tess in a Ralph Lauren halter-neck from his collection, their fate is sealed. Their unlikely marriage seems to work: Leon worships her beauty, finds he can even manage to be affectionate, and Tess takes her lust elsewhere. When Tess dies of cancer, Leon is devastated. Desperate to keep his connection to her, he pores over anything associated with Tess and stumbles on evidence of a lover, a man for whom she evicted her Kurdish friends from Joyful. Professor Emmanuel Delli and his wife, Daanya, a paediatrician, are also grieving as both their son and daughter have died violent deaths. In Yackandandah, the Professor’s dysfunctional reactions, now escalating into madness, have alienated the community. Also living in Yackandandah is Tess’s Polish lover, Daniel, part of a strange little threesome including his lover, Emily and her husband Gareth. When Leon heads to Joyful, their paths are eventually bound to cross. Hillman gives the reader a diverse cast of support characters: a swearing priest; a delightful pair of indigenous squatters; a determined shop manager; an exasperating psychotherapist; a sympathetic researcher, a pragmatic policeman, an infatuated great aunt, a progressive father. This book is filled with beautiful descriptive prose: “The paddocks along the highway were fawn and wilted yellow after a summer of ferocious heat. Bony outcrops of granite glittered on the hillsides, the fabric of earth worn away like the elbows of an ancient garment.” and “The foliage of the trees became a theatre of silhouettes, growing blacker as the night deepened. The moon formed a sharper and sharper arc halfway up the sky until it seemed too distinct to be merely natural. As the hours passed the stars thickened. By midnight they looked as crafted as the moon.” and “It was as if the message of his aversion had reached her after a technical delay in which it circled the earth blindly twice or fifty times, and was only now having its impact.” are just a few examples. Hillman endows Leon with the sort of madness that is only possible for the independently wealthy, but also gives him plenty of words of wisdom: “…victims are often ambitious. They write themselves into whatever drama they can find.” and “The passions of the timid were as punishing as those of the extroverted.” and “It was true of many people that the best of them only ever comes to life in the imagination of another.” This novel touches on mental disorders, on grief and loss, and on the plight of Kurds; it features heartbreak, jealousy, distress, shame and obsession; Utopias, Islam and the work of Wordsworth also play a part. The subject matter could make for heavy going, but there is humour and there is hope to give balance. This decidedly original novel will stay with the reader long after the last page is turned. A moving and very enjoyable read.

[Laura.125Pages · Rating 2 out of 5]

*I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
Original review posted on www.125pages.wordpress.com

Leon Joyce is a complicated non-complicated man. He does not feel traditional desire in the sexual manner but feels immensely towards objects of beauty. One of these objects is Tess Wachowicz; a women who fits his aesthetic ideal. He marries her knowing she has dalliances but is mostly content that they are meaningless and she only loves him. Upon her death he hears rumors of her loving another and the search for the truth takes him on an unexpected journey.

I really wanted to like this book, the premise was intriguing and I wanted to be drawn into this world. Unfortunately this was not the case. It took three times to get past the first twenty pages, and then it was a forced read to the end. None of the characters drew me in, unfortunately they were almost universal portrayed as pretty horrible. I kept hoping for some redeeming qualities or someone I could latch on to, but alas that never happened. The story was very full with description, way too much description. Sentence after sentence describing items and things made the read draining. One sentence alone had thirty-eight items described. I was half way thru and felt I had already read a War and Peace type tome. If you cut out the extra ¼ of the book that was used to describe things and gave Leon some quality that you could root for this could be an excellent read. Joyful had the potential to be an incredible read but sadly fell short for me.

[Esosa · Rating 3 out of 5]

“If one thing is meant to be, then surely all things are meant to be and there is nothing to be done about anything.”

I picked this book out at random. Like, literally walked down one (fiction) aisle of my library, eyes closed, stretched out my hands and decided that whatever book my hand landed on, I would read.

Joyful is a book that is primarily about one man’s struggle with dealing with the loss of his wife. After Tess’s passing, Lean Joyce realizes that there were secrets his wife had kept from him during their marriage: places she had been to, people she had been with. This takes Leon on a journey to his family house in a small town called Yackandandah.

As Leon discovers more about the life his wife actually lived, we are introduced to many secondary characters (almost all of whom had crossed paths with Tess), with stories just as interesting and bizzarre.

It did start off slow, and at times it felt like the secondary characters were taken on such huge stories of their own, to the point were it felt like it was impossible to make a connection back to the story of Tess and Leon.

However, during the last 100 pages or so, everything did start to connect. It was a pretty interesting story. And I think I’ll be picking more books at random every once in a while.

[Lolly K Dandeneau · Rating 3 out of 5]

Slow start for a strange story. Leon Joyce falls for Tess Wachowicz for her stlyish beauty more than her sexual being. He has a thing about clothes/fashion, and at first one wonders 'is he gay', but no. He had never been interested or inspired much about sexuality with a male or a female, but I may say he has a fetish where beautiful clothes are concerned. There are all kinds of passion in the world and in this novel. But when he and Tess marry he becomes intimate with her and yet being a very sexual woman she sates herself elsewhere. When Tess dies, Leon will discover all her secrets, including her lovers (entanglements aplenty). The cast is certainly diverse and somehow Leon's strange ways isn't the only core of the story. The Kurds are an important storyline, as much as Leon, and there is mental illness within. This novel is hard to review because it's peculiar, I sat with it for a few days. The writing is beautiful but the story itself had me mixed up. For someone who wants something unusual, this may be it.

[Tim Arundell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Found first half sluggish but second half action was more enlightening with the character development and back story that had been set up. Certainly a story to illustrate patience, persistence and love

[Dale · Rating 2 out of 5]

Its confluence of storylines is remarkable, interplaying concurrently via simultaneously authentic and extraordinary narratives; tangling, disengaging, and dispersing after having finally spent themselves out.

[Nola B · Rating 3 out of 5]

"Joyful" is a story primarily concerned with profound grief : that of Leon for his Tess and of Emmanual for his Sophia. The book, however,has many light moments that stopped me from getting too emotionally distressed whilst reading it ie. the pork-chop in the water and brilliant lines like " The Doctor seemed never to have met a cliche that he couldn't embrace". I was particularly intrigued by the character of Leon , as I certainly have never met or even heard of anyone with his type of eccentric personality. The only thing that I couldn't quite reconcile was why Jennifer's part of the story was important to know, but perhaps that's just me and I missed something. I couldn't put it down and was relieved there was a kind of peace within the characters by the end.

[tessa]

The start was quite slow, it was a bit foggy. The writing is beautiful, but the story is peculiar. I love the way that passion is showed in this novel, it isn’t just about sex, but about everything else. I enjoy that he feels passion for other objects such as clothes, it gave me a sense of a new horizon in literature, and I’m glad I picked up this book. It was not the right book for me, but I learned from it, and that’s what matters. I give this book 2 out of 5 stars. It will be published July 14, 2015.

[Polly Krize · Rating 5 out of 5]

I received an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

What an enthralling read! Not at all what I expected when I picked it up, this book is full of captivating moments from the first page. Leon Joyce, a rare bookseller, has known Tess for a while before he approaches her to try on some of the haute couteur clothing from his extravagant collection. She agrees and a very complex relationship develops from there. Throughout the book, characters will entertain and vex you, but it is an enjoyable ride and highly recommended.

[Fatema Johera Ahmed · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gala to finally read the book having attended its launch. Ought to read more of Hillman! Such a warm personality!

[Nicki]

This was part of a selection of books I bought at a big book sale. It wasn’t a book I had heard of or would have sought out. I mention this as I don’t think there was anything actually wrong with the book, it just wasn’t my taste.
The opening chapters were interesting and I did think I would like it, but I didn’t as it changed direction a little.