Summary Of Everett De Morier's Thirty-Three Novels

Thirty-three Cecils is a tragedy. This isn 't a spoiler: the novel says so right in its prologue. What is surprising is how uplifting this tragedy is. That 's because, as with all good stories, it 's not what happens that matters as much as how something happens. And Everett De Morier 's first novel isn 't just a good story, but a great, sad and deeply humane tale about loss and redemption.

The novel purports to tell a true story of Walker Roe and Riley Dutcher who, in the early 1990s, came into the national spotlight due to a series of remarkable and controversial events they 've been involved in. It does so through recently uncovered journals - equally fictional, of course - written by Walker and Riley to explain how these two people, these complete strangers with seemingly nothing in common, came to meet.

At first glance, the two couldn 't be more different. While Walker Roe is an award-winning animator, Riley Dutcher

One of them involves death. The other, a mysterious appearance of a bicycle in an apartment kitchen. But maybe, just maybe, these events might offer Walker and Riley a chance for a better life. But it is here that the third, unnamed protagonist of the story comes to the front - society itself. While complete strangers offer Riley help, next door neighbors scorn Walker. At every step, the ever-volatile opinion of the public, shaped by prejudice and the media both hinders and helps these two men - even more so than their own internal flaws.

The story of Walker Roe and Riley Dutcher could have been easily written as a simple morality tale and, in a way, that 's what it is. However, instead of banal moralizing about the sins of lying or crime or alcohol or whatever, De Morier is far more interested in a story about human imperfection and the way our thirst for success and recognition battles with our need to simply be better with ourselves and each