Frobisch's Angel

Visiting Rome to see his estranged daughter, Howard Frobisch, a Washington accountant, sees an angel who, apparently, gives Frobisch the power of clairvoyance

In her first novel, Rochlin tries to enter Philip Roth country, but doesn't quite carry it off. Frobisch is a 51-year-old, divorced, alienated Jewish accountant. He has the Midas touch in reverse: everything turns to dross. While in Rome during a papal election, Frobisch has a vision of an angel who tells him, "Do good. Stop messing up." Thereafter, Frobisch has flashes of precognition (it is 1978, and he knows, for example, that the new Pope will die within weeks) and a sudden, overwhelmingly painful sense of compassion. He is in constant contact with his adversarial ex-wife Sadie and at war with his daughter, while at the same time his closest friend, Father Paul, tries unsuccessfully to help him. In the end, while Frobisch is given an opportunity to put his life back together, he is still looking for some mysterious "magic" to transform his existence. The question remains: is the angel just hallucination, symbolizing his inner turmoil? Although Rochlin is a talented writer, her story is too skimpy and her narrative tone not sardonic enough to carry of this fairly uneventful character study.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Howard Frobisch is in Rome at the time of the papal conclave in 1978 when he suddenly has a vision on the Spanish Stepsan angel tells him to "Do good. Quit messing up." Howard attempts to deny the experience, yet upon returning home to his trendy Washington, D.C., suburb, he finds the visitation has upset his life. A new-found compassion causes trouble with his ex-wife. A gift of clairvoyance enables him to predict the untimely death of the new pope. As a desire to return to his former life competes with a desire to explore a higher sense of purpose, his relationship with his new girlfriend and encounters with a dying cancer patient become complicated. Rochlin's first novel is a humorous and marvelously human tale of a modern everyman encountering spiritual forces far beyond his understanding. Lawrence Rungren, Bedford Free P.L., Mass.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc.