The Full Ridiculous: A Novel

by Mark Lamprell

Overview

Michaelo O’Dell is hit by a car, and when he doesn’t die, he is surprised and pleased. But he can’t seem to move, frozen in the crash position. He can’t concentrate, or control his anger and grief, or work out what to do about much of anything. His professional life begins to crumble, and although his wife Wendy is heroically supportive, his teenage children only exacerbate his post-accident angst. His daughter Rosie punches out a vindictive schoolmate, plunging the family into a special parent-teacher hell. Meanwhile, his son Declan is found with a stash of illicit drugs, and a strange policeman starts harassing the family, causing ordinary mishaps to take on a sinister desperation.

Equal parts hilarious and painful, this compelling novel delves into the difficulties of family, love, and the precarious business of being a man. Mark Lamprell’s extraordinary debut examines the terrible truth: sometimes you can’t pull yourself together until you’ve completely fallen apart.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781619022959
Publisher:	Catapult
Publication date:	05/13/2014
Pages:	256
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

Mark Lamprell has worked in film and television for many years. He co-wrote the film Babe: Pig in the City and wrote and directed the award-winning feature My Mother Frank. The Full Ridiculous is his first novel. He lives in Australia.

Read an Excerpt

Halfway through a ten-kilometre run, you have yet another premonition that you’re hit by a car while jogging so you decide to outwit the fates by changing course, heading down Hastings Road instead of up it. Rather than risk the usual dash across the intersection, you wait at the pedestrian crossing for a sleek green four-wheel-drive to pass on your right. Summer is toppling into Autumn but it’s still hot and you wipe the sweat from your forehead with the back of your hand. Looking left, you see an old blue sedan approaching and make eye contact with the driver who is lit by a flash of early-morning sun. You stride confidently across the worn white stripes and almost reach the other side of the road when, out of the corner of your left eye, you see something blue.

The blue sedan.

It’s less than a body length away, and it’s not stopping.

Time slows, just like in the movies, which is ironic because you work in the movies. Well not in the movies, around the movies; you write about movies, ‘clever’ features poking fun at filmmakers who may not be creative geniuses but

at least they’ve had a go which is more than you can say for some joggers

which is why you have this self-loathing thing going

which is why you overeat

which makes you overweight

which gives you borderline high blood pressure

which is why you’re jogging.

Milliseconds pass.

The blue car moves closer.

You recall a conversation with a stuntman during the making of the latest Mad Max movie. He’s talking about a sequence where he gets run down by one of those reptilian-looking, post-apocalyptic vehicles but you’re not really listening because you can hear an actor in the wardrobe tent complaining about his costume. He’s not really complaining; he’s just fussing about how heavy it is, but in your piece for Cinema Australasia you say he’s complaining because it adds tension.

This stuntie says the important thing is to go over the car when it hits. You go under, most likely you get stuck on some sticky-outy bit of the engine, dragged along and de-skinned, then kidney-squishingly, eye-poppingly, brain-squeezingly, run over by one or more wheels. You go over, at least you’ve got a chance if you land right.

You don’t know how you remember all this in a millisecond but you do. You even remember the stuntie sensing he doesn’t have your full attention so he gives a demonstration. You remember him lifting himself off the ground, a little jump just before the vehicle hits.

On the crossing, you are not afraid. You feel not one moment of fear. There is no time for metamorphosis so you perform an act of instantaneous transcendence. You are no longer a person. You have become a living thing with a singular objective: to remain what you are: alive.

You start to turn to face the blue car but you can’t turn far in a millisecond.

You can think a lot but you can’t do a lot. You do, however, manage to raise yourself off the road a little before the car drives into your left thigh,

still in slow motion.

You feel no pain.

And that’s all you remember.

Editorial Reviews

"Lamprell takes us through this period of growth and tumult in Michael O'Dell's life in a way that feels authentic and real, the worst moments are also some of the most humorous and touching . . . Readers who enjoy work written in the tone of life, and narratives that celebrate the minor (in the grand scheme of things) wins and losses that make up life will find The Full Ridiculous an enjoyable read that finds both levity and gravity in those little moments." —Examiner

"The writing is clean and hilarious, and the second-person narration feels intimate . . . A hilarious, high-speed summer read." —Shelf Awareness

"The Full Ridiculous will appeal to readers of quirky, contemporary fiction such as The Rosie Project or The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. It reminds us that sometimes, to really appreciate the beautiful highs of life, you need to hit rock bottom first." —Bookseller and Publisher

"A lovely coming-of-age story about a middle-aged man who hurts, despairs, heals and comes to understanding. A very funny and truthful novel." –Kirkus Reviews

"Lamprell debuts with a first-rate novel [and] manages to temper sentimentalism with a tonic wryness." —Publisher's Weekly

From the Publisher

2014-02-04
A middle-aged husband and father endures a year of agonizing discovery in this humorous twist on the coming-of-age novel, Lamprell's debut. Michael O'Dell, unemployed Australian movie critic, is hit by a car while jogging one summer day, and nothing is the same after. He dives into a depression that deepens as his wife, Wendy Weinstein, tries to mitigate his angst, while his children, Rosie and Declan, only heighten it by the simple act of being teenagers. Lamprell gets the dialogue, the interactions, the hopelessness-turned-ecstasy in families just right. The "full ridiculous" of the title is Michael's description of the facts of his life in this story—most bittersweetly ridiculous is that it is a universal story for all families, anywhere. Lamprell uses a narrative technique that at first feels like stage direction. He has Michael narrate in the second person, where "you" is he, Michael. At first unnerving, over time, you, the reader, get the rhythm and, by the end, perhaps realize it is you, any one of us, whom this story is about. Michael says "[y]ou are an unremarkable man living an unremarkable life except for this single thing: you love and are splendidly loved." To get to that realization, Michael takes one hilarious step after another, from his daughter's potential expulsion from school to his son's alleged drug use to Michael being criminally investigated for a toy pistol used in his son's school film project. Michael, awash in depression and fear, does not see the joke, and while this story is a comic journey for us, it remains an angst-ridden discovery for Michael. Lamprell has written a lovely coming-of-age story about a middle-aged man who hurts, despairs, heals and comes to understanding. A very funny and truthful novel.

Kirkus Reviews