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The Ragged Way People Fall Out of Love (North Point 1991) In Stringer's
Ridge, N.C., the marriage of William Hanner, architect, and artist Molly
is dissolving. Although William precipitates the break and Molly acquiesces
passively, both are distressed: ``They didn't yet realize the ragged way
people fall out of love and how it is never completely done.'' In her
second novel, Cox (Familiar Ground) tells us how Molly, in her daily life
as mother--of 16-year-old Joe, Franci, who's 12, and Lucas, age 7--both
relinquishes love and claims it. With her recently widowed father, Molly
looks back at childhood experiences of loving; with her astronomy teacher,
she considers loving anew; with her children, and with the sympathetic
figure of a local misfit, she is reminded of the vulnerability inherent
in attachment. Cox's simple, meticulous prose infuses this domestic tale
with a subtle force, but the full effect of her insight is constrained
by an flatness in tone and an excess of metaphoric material--Molly's art,
lunar eclipse, the disappearance of her son, a fatal fire--that ultimately
create distance rather than intimacy. Cox's clear-eyed vision, especially
keen when trained on family dramas, remains unique and promising. |