Budge

From the author of ''Dead Man In the Orchestra Pit'' and ''Foozlers'', comes another tale of madcap human folly. Louella Debra Poule is doing an eighteen-month stint on a weapons charge at a minimum security institution up BC''s Fraser Valley. Her drug dealing, sort-of-boyfriend Jimmy Flood, and his sidekick, Blacky Harbottle, should have taken the rap, but with their list of "priors" and pending drug charges, a weapons offense would have put them in the slammer for quite a little stay. Louella did the "right thing"; she did what was expected of her by those on the street. Six months into Louella''s sentence, her mother dies. Upon Louella''s early release (recommended on good behaviour and for pursuing sincere in-roads to rehabilitation) she discovers that she has inherited a good deal of money and a nice condo in a treed and quiet suburb of Vancouver. It is here that Louella Poule sits in relative anonymity and safety, here that she decides to take some time away from the influence of her former "associates," tend her mother''s garden, maintain her new-found sobriety, and reassess her life. But, as so often happens, her past comes a callin''. A story of addiction, rehabilitation, and finding meaning in life. " ''Budge'' is one of the more quirky, unconventional, picaresque novels to come along in a while. It can be pleasurable, if the reader is willing to roll with Osborne''s approach to prose, which is original, if not necessarily expedient. Osborne tends to dance all around a point before he makes it, and his paragraphs can go on for quite a bit, without necessarily being cumbersome. In comparison to similar authors, he''s like Faulkner without the density, Stein without the obtuseness, or Thomas Wolfe without the extravagance; of those, he''s closest to Wolfe. There''s a rhythm to Budge''s text that Osborne might not have achieved with a more minimalist approach. There''s a sense he''s luxuriating in the weaving of his narrative, repeating certain key phrases, winkingat the reader and leading him through a meandering, though focused plot. To fully appreciate ''Budge'', we must relinquish our trust to Osborne, a somewhat loopy shaman. ...Tom Osborne warrants a great deal of praise for freshness of content, viewpoint, and plot. He knows how to use language with skill and verve. ..." -Foreword Reviews