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The Delectable Mountains: or, Entertaining Strangers
Filled with poignancy, humor and eccentric revelations, The Delectable Mountains is a hilarious romp through the melodramatic tumult of growing up and falling in love. Life seems to have little to offer Devin Donahue at the age of 23. Graduation thrust him out of college against his will, and the love of his life just left him to marry his older brother. With a broken heart and no direction to speak of, Devin pounces on his first opportunity to skip town―an invitation to help run a summer theater in Colorado with his high-school sweetheart.
Upon arrival, Devin is shoved into a torrential melodrama of barroom brawls, outrageous love triangles and the worst performance of Hedda Gabler ever produced. He is sucked into the action by myriad batty characters, including a maniacal political dramatist, an emaciated director riddled with d.t.'s and a bipolar actor whose luck―and money―are about to run out. All the while Devin must fumble through his own awkward attempts at love―and somehow manage to come out on the other side.
Upon arrival, Devin is shoved into a torrential melodrama of barroom brawls, outrageous love triangles and the worst performance of Hedda Gabler ever produced. He is sucked into the action by myriad batty characters, including a maniacal political dramatist, an emaciated director riddled with d.t.'s and a bipolar actor whose luck―and money―are about to run out. All the while Devin must fumble through his own awkward attempts at love―and somehow manage to come out on the other side.
- GenresFiction
321 pages, Paperback
Published November 1, 2002
2 people are currently reading
81 people want to read
About the author
Michael Malone
84 books206 followersMichael Malone was the author of ten novels, a collection of short stories, and two works of nonfiction. Educated at Carolina and at Harvard, he was a professor in Theater Studies at Duke University. Among his prizes are the Edgar, the O. Henry, the Writers Guild Award, and the Emmy. He lived in Hillsborough, North Carolina, with his wife.
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
March 3, 2017
A perfect book to begin this year's reading challenge. Loved it.
December 31, 2015
Not worth revisiting.
The Delectable Mountains is one of Michael Malone's earliest novels--and it shows. It shows in that the book is not very good. And it shows in that there are themes, structures, and traits he would develop to better effect in later books.
Malone has a bumptious writing style, and it is on display here, in the person of Devin Donahue, the protagonist, and very much a Southern character (in a Western setting.) Devin recognizes that he is a character, playing a part--which is unsurprising, given that this book, like may of Malone's is interested in the stage, and it's metaphors.
Obviously, there are elements here that would be used in the much better Foolscap. There are also elements of (what I think of as) Malone's best work, Dingley Falls: Malone wants not just o tell the story of Devin and his funny adventures, but encompass the entire town of Floren Park, Colorado. It's hard to do, though, because the perspective is limited by what Devin can know--rather than the omniscient narration of Dingley Falls--and because the town is so small that any secrets feel false, anybody not already knowing another person unlikely.
What balances the boisterous language and voice of Foolscap and Dingley Falls is the recognition of real characters underneath the pose, the moments of truth. (Foolscap was probably harder to pull off, for all that I like Dingley Falls better, since Malone gave himself less room, fewer characters, and a limited range of moods in which to work.) Here those moments of truth are incredibly rare, only one or two--such as when Devin admits he still felt like he was at home, and couldn't quite jibe his midnset with the place.
Otherwise, Devin, and through him most of the other characters, feel hollow. The poetical rhapsodies and sidelights that make Dingley Falls feel alive, and weird, here just feel like more poses.
(The scene telling the story of the first play using Devin's settings is funny, though.)
The story is about Devin, a shiftless North Carolinian just out of Harvard who heads off with a friend to work at a small theater in a small Colorado town, run by a high-school sweetheart, the adventures he has there, the oddball characters he meets there, and his eventual decision to return home and do something small to better the world.
Malone solved the problem of bumptiousness differently in his Cuddy and Justin novels, by wedding the outrageously literary talk and blue-streaks of cursing to stories rooted in a recognizable world--so that it was possible for the reader to build a bridge between the characters and the fictional universe. Here, though, setting is both too small and too unrealistic, so often decorated by either false-sounding characters or stereotypes that cannot break free of the trappings in which he imprisons them.
So, skip this one, and read one of his better, later novels.
The Delectable Mountains is one of Michael Malone's earliest novels--and it shows. It shows in that the book is not very good. And it shows in that there are themes, structures, and traits he would develop to better effect in later books.
Malone has a bumptious writing style, and it is on display here, in the person of Devin Donahue, the protagonist, and very much a Southern character (in a Western setting.) Devin recognizes that he is a character, playing a part--which is unsurprising, given that this book, like may of Malone's is interested in the stage, and it's metaphors.
Obviously, there are elements here that would be used in the much better Foolscap. There are also elements of (what I think of as) Malone's best work, Dingley Falls: Malone wants not just o tell the story of Devin and his funny adventures, but encompass the entire town of Floren Park, Colorado. It's hard to do, though, because the perspective is limited by what Devin can know--rather than the omniscient narration of Dingley Falls--and because the town is so small that any secrets feel false, anybody not already knowing another person unlikely.
What balances the boisterous language and voice of Foolscap and Dingley Falls is the recognition of real characters underneath the pose, the moments of truth. (Foolscap was probably harder to pull off, for all that I like Dingley Falls better, since Malone gave himself less room, fewer characters, and a limited range of moods in which to work.) Here those moments of truth are incredibly rare, only one or two--such as when Devin admits he still felt like he was at home, and couldn't quite jibe his midnset with the place.
Otherwise, Devin, and through him most of the other characters, feel hollow. The poetical rhapsodies and sidelights that make Dingley Falls feel alive, and weird, here just feel like more poses.
(The scene telling the story of the first play using Devin's settings is funny, though.)
The story is about Devin, a shiftless North Carolinian just out of Harvard who heads off with a friend to work at a small theater in a small Colorado town, run by a high-school sweetheart, the adventures he has there, the oddball characters he meets there, and his eventual decision to return home and do something small to better the world.
Malone solved the problem of bumptiousness differently in his Cuddy and Justin novels, by wedding the outrageously literary talk and blue-streaks of cursing to stories rooted in a recognizable world--so that it was possible for the reader to build a bridge between the characters and the fictional universe. Here, though, setting is both too small and too unrealistic, so often decorated by either false-sounding characters or stereotypes that cannot break free of the trappings in which he imprisons them.
So, skip this one, and read one of his better, later novels.
March 24, 2013
This is Michael Malone's Ulysses, but using Dante's Inferno instead. Like Joyce, he uses the structure of the original text to create a very different beast.
"The Delectable Mountains" is named after the mountains that Virgil suggested that Dante climb before they went on their merry way down to Hell. This fact we get from the epigraph of the book. And there are a lot of other clues that this book has a lot to owe to Dante. The book has 33 chapters to the Inferno's 33 cantos. The protagonist, Devin Donahue is transported out of his cushy home by his guide Verl (Virgil) to the Rocky Mountains, where this comedic inferno is set. And the last word in the book, is "stars", famously just like the Inferno.
After I had sussed out that the Inferno was the template, I expected that there would be definite correlations to the damned souls and their torments that Dante and Virgil encountered on their descent through the circles of the Underground. Thank God there wasn't, as that would get tiresome. Dante already wrote it, we don't need a rewrite.
But what does Malone use the Inferno for in this book? What does it add to what he is doing? I'm sorry to say, not a lot, leastways what I can get on a first reading. The action revolves around a community theater struggling to stay open with hardly any talent, audience or hope. Which is a kind of hell, I guess.
The best I can come up with is that the journey Devin goes on is a journey out of himself, just like Dante's journey opened him up. Devin had be relatively sheltered and the summer cured him of his crush on his Beatrice, cured him of his academic life, and taught him to have a positive influence on his world, as one character puts it: "You said the craziness and the ugliness will never go away, will only change its clothes. You said the only thing to do is laugh and grow roses."
Grow roses and hopefully teach others about the thorns before they sting.
"The Delectable Mountains" is named after the mountains that Virgil suggested that Dante climb before they went on their merry way down to Hell. This fact we get from the epigraph of the book. And there are a lot of other clues that this book has a lot to owe to Dante. The book has 33 chapters to the Inferno's 33 cantos. The protagonist, Devin Donahue is transported out of his cushy home by his guide Verl (Virgil) to the Rocky Mountains, where this comedic inferno is set. And the last word in the book, is "stars", famously just like the Inferno.
After I had sussed out that the Inferno was the template, I expected that there would be definite correlations to the damned souls and their torments that Dante and Virgil encountered on their descent through the circles of the Underground. Thank God there wasn't, as that would get tiresome. Dante already wrote it, we don't need a rewrite.
But what does Malone use the Inferno for in this book? What does it add to what he is doing? I'm sorry to say, not a lot, leastways what I can get on a first reading. The action revolves around a community theater struggling to stay open with hardly any talent, audience or hope. Which is a kind of hell, I guess.
The best I can come up with is that the journey Devin goes on is a journey out of himself, just like Dante's journey opened him up. Devin had be relatively sheltered and the summer cured him of his crush on his Beatrice, cured him of his academic life, and taught him to have a positive influence on his world, as one character puts it: "You said the craziness and the ugliness will never go away, will only change its clothes. You said the only thing to do is laugh and grow roses."
Grow roses and hopefully teach others about the thorns before they sting.
January 29, 2022
From Fantastic Fiction
"Life seems to have little to offer Devin Donahue at the age of 23. Graduation thrust him out of college against his will, and the love of his life just left him to marry his older brother. With a broken heart and no direction to speak of, Devin pounces on his first opportunity to skip town-an invitation to help run a summer theater in Colorado with his high-school sweetheart.
Upon arrival, Devin is shoved into a torrential melodrama of barroom brawls, outrageous love triangles, and the worst performance of Hedda Gabler ever produced. He is sucked into the action by myriad batty characters, including a maniacal political dramatist, an emaciated director riddled with d.t.'s, and a bipolar actor whose luck and money are about to run out. All the while Devin must fumble through his own awkward attempts at love and somehow manage to come out on the other side.
Filled with poignancy, humor and eccentric revelations, The Delectable Mountains is a hilarious romp through the melodramatic tumult of growing up and falling in love."
"Life seems to have little to offer Devin Donahue at the age of 23. Graduation thrust him out of college against his will, and the love of his life just left him to marry his older brother. With a broken heart and no direction to speak of, Devin pounces on his first opportunity to skip town-an invitation to help run a summer theater in Colorado with his high-school sweetheart.
Upon arrival, Devin is shoved into a torrential melodrama of barroom brawls, outrageous love triangles, and the worst performance of Hedda Gabler ever produced. He is sucked into the action by myriad batty characters, including a maniacal political dramatist, an emaciated director riddled with d.t.'s, and a bipolar actor whose luck and money are about to run out. All the while Devin must fumble through his own awkward attempts at love and somehow manage to come out on the other side.
Filled with poignancy, humor and eccentric revelations, The Delectable Mountains is a hilarious romp through the melodramatic tumult of growing up and falling in love."
August 22, 2018
I rated this book a little lower than the last one of his I read. It really felt like two books--a humorous novel with tons of laugh out loud moments that halfway through turned serious. I had bought into the characters enough to finish it, but it just wasn't at the 5 star level.
July 9, 2009
Not my favorite of the Michael Malone books...I think this is one of his early works. It was awhile ago when I read it...but I remember this one being less entertaining than his other books, which are fabulous!
January 31, 2014
Written in 1976, this novel shows signs of Malone's promise - the richly comic characters, the dialogue, the elaborate but satisfying plot - which all mature and bloom in his later fiction from Dingley Falls to the present. It's a literary trifle, but a harbinger of good things to come.
September 18, 2007
Not so much.
February 3, 2017
Suck my dick, Michael Malone, for wasting my time like this.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews