"Divine Intervention" by Edward Davies

BOOK TITLE: Divine Intervention
AUTHOR: Edward Davies
YEAR: 2011
GENRE: Fiction
SUBGENRE: Supernatural Comedy
GRADE: Mixed


Jimmy Stewart Moon is a lovable loser with a low-paying job, a place to live at his parents’ house, and too much free time on his hands. When eating potato chips and picking his nose isn’t enough to entertain him, Jimmy takes out his binoculars and spies on his sexy neighbor Vanessa, who’s doing exercises in her underwear. Vanessa catches Jimmy in the act and the perverted voyeur falls out of the window and hits the ground hard. Upon waking up, he meets two angels named Pixie and Frank whose only way of getting back into heaven is to help Jimmy secure a romantic relationship with Vanessa, which is a hard sell considering he just got caught spying on her.

In many ways, this self-published effort reminds me of a book by WWE superstar Dolph Ziggler’s brother Ryan Nemeth called “I Can Make Out with Any Girl Here”. The protagonists in both stories are trying to get laid and they do some silly things along the path of their goals. The funniest part of this story in my opinion is when Jimmy dresses up like an 80’s punk to try and impress Vanessa, but instead looks like a homeless drug addict. Not off to a good start, Mr. Moon! It gets sillier from there. With the English backdrop, this book also reminds me of Monty Python, Danger Mouse, and John Oliver’s show rolled up into one chaotic comedy while dropping a bucket full of LSD. This story is quite possibly the weirdest thing I’ve ever read, but I mean that in the most loving way.

Despite the weirdness of it all, the further you get into this book, the more it begins to read like a legitimate plot instead of just a hodgepodge of comedic antics. We have an imperfect protagonist in Jimmy Stewart Moon. We have a low point near the end. We have a believable climax. And most importantly, we have an ending that nobody would have seen coming for miles, yet that too is believable. I will say though that it takes a great deal of patience to get through the first few pages. Upon first glance, I thought it was going to be TOO weird for my tastes, but my patience paid off and I read an entertaining story.

But just like with any mixed review, there are some complaints that need to be addressed. Although they are few and far between, this book does have its fair share of grammatical errors, misspellings, and other mistakes that no beta reader would ever let slide. But I personally will let this slide because the mistakes don’t corrupt the entire story. It was still enjoyable, but having a beta reader sweep through the errors would be a good call on Mr. Davies’ part.

The only other complaint I need to address is the liberal use of pop culture references. Normally when using these references, there should also be a description of what that reference looks like. For example, if someone looks like Jessica Rabbit, I expect that author to describe her as having long red hair, a seductive face, and a red cocktail dress. While some people have an idea of what the celebrity, TV show, or movie is like already, not everybody fits that bill. It would be like talking to a wrestling fan born in the 2000’s and watching him scratch his head at the mention of Mr. Perfect. It doesn’t even have to be a generational barrier; it could just be someone who has never seen the medium before.

I’m giving this story a mixed grade and not a failing one, because the positives heavily outweigh the negatives. It’s a short book and it reads quickly, so if you don’t have the patience to blow through such a story, I don’t know what to tell you. I blew through it and I enjoyed it every step of the way. Not bad for an author who wrote this story at a young age!