Book Review: The Old Place by Bobby Finger
By Maddie Woda
The best love stories don’t have to be romantic, which Bobby Finger proves in his debut novel, The Old Place. When we meet Mary Alice Roth, longtime resident of middle-of-nowhere Billington, Texas, she’s in the process of rekindling her friendship with her next-door neighbor Ellie. We know they had a falling out after their sons, best friends of their own, died years ago. Because Mary Alice and Ellie’s friendship is rooted in so much history, they only need to begin drinking coffee together every morning to remember why they’re important to each other. Mary Alice, consistently crotchety, complains to Ellie about the young Billington transplant, Josie, who succeeded her as a math teacher at the high school. Ellie listens, and shares good news of her own.
In the midst of reconnecting, their friendship is threatened when Mary Alice’s sister returns to Billington with an enormous secret, one that has been haunting Mary Alice for years. It’s the kind of secret that tears people—and quiet communities like Billington—apart. Mary Alice can choose to remain as stubborn as she’s always been, or she can open up to the people who mean the most to her. The Old Place proves that love—romantic, familial, or friendly—is complicated and messy but always worth it.
Finger does an excellent job of teasing out the novel’s tension, as simmering as the Texas sun. The Old Place’s twist is genuinely surprising but feels exactly right once you have the hindsight to line up all the clues. Some of the plotlines fade off toward the end of the book (like Mary Alice’s wrath over being forcibly retired), but the characters stay consistent and enjoyable. At its heart, this novel is the story of best friendship: between sisters, between lonely sons, and especially between neighbors. It is charming, almost quaint, in the way small towns are. I’m already excited to see what Finger writes next.
++
Maddie Woda is a graduate of Columbia University in New York City with a degree in English. She has writing published in The Maine Review, The Columbia Review, Dead Fern Press, The Emerson Review, and others. She currently lives in Brooklyn and is an editor at Zibby Books.