The Crooked Heart of Mercy - Hardcover

Livingston, Billie

3.48

486 ratings by Goodreads

9780345815385: The Crooked Heart of Mercy

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0345815386 ISBN 13: 9780345815385

Publisher: Random House Canada, 2016

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The Crooked Heart of Mercy is a brave, funny and heartbreaking novel about faith and family, love and forgiveness, and how people survive unimaginable loss. It features an indelible trio of characters who could only come from the imagination of Billie Livingston. There's Ben, whose world we enter on the first page: he's a limo driver who, after he loses his son, finds himself locked up in a psych ward with a hole in his head he can't explain. His wife, Maggie, the other narrator of the story, is locked up in her own grief, unable to reach out to her husband. Then there is Maggie's brother, Francis, an unlikely priest with a drinking problem and only occasional interest in celibacy, whose latest fall from the wagon was caught on video and has gone viral as Drunk Priest Propositions Cop.
How they come together to heal each other's many wounds is the magic of this novel, as is its intensity, its wit, its deep sense of the absurd, and the surprising grace at its core.

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From the Back Cover:

Ben wakes up in a hospital with a hole in his head he can’t explain. What he can remember he’d rather forget. Like how he’d spent nights as a limo driver for the wealthy and debauched . . . how he and his wife, Maggie, drifted apart in the wake of an unspeakable tragedy . . . how his little brother, Cola, got in over his head with loan sharks circling.

Maggie is alone. Again. With bills to pay and Ben in a psych ward, she must return to work. But who would hire her in the state she’s in? And just as Maggie turns to her brother, Francis, the Internet explodes with a video of his latest escapade. The headline? Drunk Priest Propositions Cops.

Francis is an unlikely priest with a drinking problem and little interest in celibacy. A third DUI, a looming court date. . . .When Maggie takes him in, he knows he may be down to his last chance. And his best shot at healing might lay in helping Maggie and Ben reconnect—against all odds.

“The poignant story of broken people trying desperately to be whole, lost somewhere between a prayer and a wish. Raw and heartfelt. Remarkable.”—Will Ferguson, Giller Prize-winning author of 419

About the Author:

BILLIE LIVINGSTON is the author of three novels, short stories, including the Danuta Gleed and CBC Bookie award-winning collection Greedy Little Eyes, and poetry. Her previous novel, One Good Hustle, a Globe and Mail Best Book, was longlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize and nominated for the Canadian Library Association's Young Adult Book Award. Her short story, "Sitting on the Edge of Marlene," has been adapted as a feature film. She lives in Vancouver. The author lives in Vancouver, BC.

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