Occasionally, the stories that seem most quiet and humble are the ones that leave the loudest din in their wake. That applies to Wendy Jones's The Thoughts and Happenings of Wilfred Price, Purveyor of Superior Funerals--and to Wilfred, whose marriage proposal is the catalyst for a series of events both heartrending and profound. The novel's sweet and simple premise initially belies the tumultuous, perilous world of its 1920s Welsh countryside setting, where townspeople bicycle to and from the local general store, families cope with the loss of loved ones in the First World War and locals struggle to keep their private dramas from entering the town's formidable rumor mill.
For Wilfred, the tumult makes navigating the channels of engagement and marriage that much trickier, as his spontaneous proposal sets off a chain of events that ultimately forces him to choose between honor and passion. Though the story alone is a sturdy drama with many moving parts, the novel is most potent for its fearlessness; what initially seems to be a whimsical, cheeky European romance finds gravity in Jones's refusal to skim the surface, diving into the inner lives of those around Wilfred. The reader follows Jones's characters as they wade through crises as grave as they are private, including pregnancies, broken hearts and an inability to swim against the tide of small-town judgment. While the process might be slow, it leads to a highly rewarding--and unflinchingly candid--slice of early 20th-century Welsh life. --Linnie Greene, bookseller at Flyleaf Books, Chapel Hill, N.C., and freelance writer