Books

The Gargoyle
By Andrew Davidson, Doubleday, 2008, 468 pp.

It's a cliché that rings true … save for what it's overtly referring to.

"Never judge a book by its cover."

This may work for relationships, buying a used car, a new home or trying to size up an opponent before a bar brawl.

But when it comes to judging books, the cover's generally the quickest and easiest place to start. They are designed with specific readers in mind. There's a reason mystery novels are dark, ominous and brooding — perhaps featuring shadowy figures captured stalking back alleys. It's meant to attract readers in search of a thriller. Romance novels feature ripped bodices and muscular men. Cook books feature food and fantasy novels depict strange lands and stranger creatures.

Readers buy books because of what they see on the cover and they generally get what they pay for — at least in terms of genre. The quality of the literature hidden within is a whole other argument.

But there are exceptions to the rule. Case-in-point — The Gargoyle, a dark, strange and intriguing love story by first-time novelist Andrew Davidson. The cover features a woman with angel wings tattooed across the entirety of her back. Remove the dust jacket to reveal the glossy illustration of a flaming heart.

Total cheese, an obvious ploy to separate the lovelorn from their money. But it was a free book, so I figured … what the heck … 20 pages in, I was hooked.

It's a story that transcends time, space and common sense by consuming a multiplicity of genres ranging from fantasy to historical fiction, mystery to quasi-memoir.

The story revolves around an unnamed narrator who, following a coked-out car crash, has experienced third-degree burns over 90 percent of his body. In order to survive the torments of rehab in the burn unit, the narrator begins to plot his suicide, planning to work just hard enough to regain enough strength to leave the hospital and blow his brains out.

But then a mysterious woman named Marianne Engel appears in his room and insists that they were lovers in medieval Germany and that she has been searching for him through a series of lifetimes. The woman, who playfully leaves hand-carved gargoyles on his nightstand, is obviously insane, but her stories are so convincing that upon his release this "living monster" chooses to move into Marianne's mansion rather than commit suicide.

As morphine addiction and guilt from a life of sin and indulgence clouds his mind, the narrator is drawn ever deeper into the abyss of this deathless love affair. But things truly take a turn for the bizarre when Marianne gets word from God that she has only a few more sculptures to complete before her time on earth runs out.

Marianne's so convincing in her storytelling, the narrator and readers alike will be wondering … could this all be for real?

Though the characters are fully realized and the plot is tight and well executed, what makes Davidson's novel a triumph is the history. As these lovers' past lives bounce between ancient Japan, Iceland, Italy and England, each and every time period is rich with vivid detail, which could also be something of a sticking point as the abundance of description — especially the earlier parts before Marianne's arrival — can bog the story down at times. And the story-within-a-story concept is a bit convoluted.

Overall, The Gargoyle is a fantastic read about love, redemption and madness that defies both logic and clichés about judging books by their covers.