Juno Loves Legs

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However, the book can be unrelentingly bleak at times, and it can be a bit of a chore to parse given all of the slang that’s used. In een toegankelijke, nietsontziende en beschouwende stijl laat de auteur je kennismaken met zijn complexe personages en met de ruige, moeilijke en regelmatig hartverscheurende omstandigheden waarin zij moeten opgroeien.

The writing is excellent, the characters Juno and Legs are lifelike, very original and wonderful and the story is oh so sad and harsh and sometimes funny. Juno Loves Legs shows the frustration of feeling trapped in a life that is not yours and the ability of friendship to lift us out of our experiences and into a truer version of ourselves. This is a volume about resilience and getting through tough times in the best way possible, and perhaps with a bit of craftiness.Set against the backdrop of Dublin in the 1980s, a place of political, social and religious change, the friends yearn for an unbound life and together they begin to fight to take up the space of who they truly are. Her only friend and ally is ‘Legs,’ a loner ostracized by the Sister for his beauty and verbally abused by the Father for his sexual orientation. We are experiencing delays with deliveries to many countries, but in most cases local services have now resumed. We use Google Analytics to see what pages are most visited, and where in the world visitors are visiting from. I may not have loved Juno Loves Legs as much as I should have, maybe, but I’ll bet that there is someone out there who might.

Juno and the friend she nicknames Legs encounter poverty and cruelty aplenty, but also moments of grace, and Geary’s writing is lovely. Those types of individuals may find this to be a treat, if, I suppose, those 12-year-old cigarette addicts are not a turnoff. Much like Geary's debut book, Montpelier Parade, which improved even more upon a second reading (something I didn't think possible), I am sure this will not only warrant, but demand another go-round. When a reader directed me to Karl Geary’s new novel, “Juno Loves Legs,” I couldn’t resist delving beneath its cover(s). How a 50-year-old man can seemingly effortlessly, and in beautifully rendered prose, capture the voice of a 12-year-old girl is nothing less than astounding.

One day, Legs decides he has had enough of the abuse and gets into the kind of trouble that they send youngsters away to juvenile detention for. I’m with Legs,” Juno says throughout the novel, “I’m with him,” until their friendship, and the story, arrive at a deeply moving conclusion that will shatter even the hardest heart. This book is memorable and deeply touching, as two misfits find each other through troubled times and know real love in a very unloving and tough world. Juno finds work and tries to put her life back together even as it is apparent that perhaps Legs’ life is conversely falling apart. Thanks to NetGalley, Dreamscape Publishing, and the author, Geary, for this advanced copy, which I wholeheartedly loved and will be pondering long after my next read.

I liked Juno as a bit of a feisty character, and the friendship she has with a gay man is certainly unconventional given the story’s setting and period. After losing her mother to a bus accident, Juno finds herself witnessing Legs committing a crime against Father that would change their friendship forever. After he is committed to a reform school, Juno moves out and becomes a street walker, sex worker, wandering aimlessly in a Dublin that seems to be out of a Dickens and Joyce novel, its image at odds with anything green or beautiful that Ireland seems to offer. The two separate for a number of years because of their shenanigans before finding each other again. He brings a place and a time to life in a way that feels authentic, without apologising for its shortcomings but littering the story with glimmers of hope and connection.

As the story goes, and at the risk of giving away too much (which one has to do because the book’s “plot” is rather unconventional), Juno is introduced as a 12-year-old whose life is marred by poverty. I do appreciate how the author showed readers two individuals who didn't quite fit in yet fit so perfectly for each other. Caught between the rich depth of her intellect and the harsh reality of her life, we follow Juno as she begins to understand how divergent a life lived and a life thought can be. My bookclub tagline for this read was “bleakness” and that is a spot on description for the essential vibe of this novel. Growing up on the estate is tough for them both, but as they emerge into the possibilities and underground parties of 1980s Dublin, they find a breathing space to begin their real lives.

While Legs is in jail, Juno’s mam is killed in a car accident, and her sister Derry, who’d been ostracized from the family, moves back home with her kids to care for her widowed father. Together, they rekindle a platonic friendship — even though it is apparent that there’s something wrong with Legs’ health. Juno is fierce, brash, her mother struggling to keep the family afloat, her father distant and drunk; “They were two mouths and I was their voice,” she tells us. Mike Maggio’s forthcoming novel, Woman in the Abbey , a gothic tale of love and betrayal, will be released by Vine Leaves Press in 2025. As Juno reunites with Legs at the final act of the novel, we see Legs, like Juno, has gotten himself into sex work as well.Juno and Legs will break your heart in the very best way and leave you laughing in spite of yourself. I lay under the tree and carefully arranged the flowers on my chest, and stayed in the grass for the longest time. By the time I finished Shuggie I had a headache and was miserable but with Juno there was so much hope. Thus, this is a novel that is the sort of thing that you’re either going to find fault with or probably just adore despite its deficiencies.