Official Review: Second Coming by Chad Gayle

[CataclysmicKnight]

[Following is an official OnlineBookClub.org review of "Second Coming" by Chad Gayle.]

---

2 out of 4 stars

---

Share This Review

---

Second Coming by Chad Gayle is a collection of five short fictional stories dealing with obsession and addition. The title is taken from the book's third story (the only story told in third person), in which Jesus has returned to Earth. He ends up bussing around America to gather followers, but spends his time obsessed with a woman named Brook. Brook was one of his earliest followers and they shared a kiss at one point. Ever since, he's had to keep his distance so no one sees him longing for her.

Emily is the title of the second story, which was absolutely my favorite of the five. In it, the unnamed main character is obsessed with the titular Emily. They're both in 10th grade, and the main character is too shy to ever speak with her. Instead he finds every possible opportunity to snap photos of her. The entire story is written in single-sentence paragraphs that really express the nervousness he feels in working up the courage to speak with her. Not only is it my favorite of the five stories, it's also the only one I really enjoyed.

Learning to Spell, Reality Show and Candy are the three remaining stories. Reality Show deals with a playboy (the unnamed main character) who finds out a girl he had been messing around with may be pregnant. Learning to Spell and Candy both deal with addiction and love in different ways: the former having an alcoholic lead character and the latter a drug-addicted love interest.

While the stories sometimes succeeded with profound, poetic lines, more often than not it was hard to figure out what was going on. Many sentences were run-ons filled with poetic devices, euphemisms and metaphors. When done right this is fantastic, but I often found myself rereading sentences or paragraphs (especially the last page of Second Coming) before getting a clear image of what was going on. Most stories also have a way of throwing the reader into the middle of things, revealing a bit of the past along with what's going on currently. This made it hard to figure things out the first time I read each story, and I really didn't enjoy them enough to read them a second time.

While I really enjoyed Emily, and I didn't find a single grammatical error in the book, I can't give Second Coming as a whole more than 2 out of 4 stars. The confusing ending of Second Coming (the short story), the lackluster endings of the rest and the confusion I frequently fought dragged the book down. I appreciate the way the book managed to focus so well on obsession and addiction, and the writing in hindsight even fits that theme. It was also fitting that the first and last stories sandwich the book - the first being about an alcoholic main character and the last being about a drug-addicted love interest - but it just isn't enough for me to recommend it.

******
Second Coming
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon

Like CataclysmicKnight's review? Post a comment saying so!

[kandscreeley]

Thanks for the review. This is definitely one that I won't be reading. It sounds like it was pretty poorly done.