Irish literature has a great tradition of novelists who love farce--Flann O'Brien, J.P. Donleavy, Roddy Doyle, Roger Boylen. Add to them first-time novelist Jeremy Massey. His smart and sassy The Last Four Days of Paddy Buckley is an outstanding contribution to this distinguished Irish tradition.
Paddy, a decent, 42-year-old undertaker in Dublin, claims Mickey Mouse as his patron saint. Mickey, he says, could always get "out of the soup with [his] spirit intact." This is what Paddy needs because just four days ago he faced a "set of circumstances so outlandish, so surreal, and so dangerous" they could only result in his death (so he says). One October morning Paddy visits Lucy, a beautiful widow, to arrange her husband's funeral, and ends up in bed with her, where she dies of an apparent prescription drug overdose. Now he has to cover it up, plus deal with "my DNA lining Lucy's birth canal." It's just the beginning of this madcap comedy of errors.
When Brigid, Lucy's lovely daughter, arrives, Paddy has to tell her of her mother's death. As he comforts her, he realizes that she's someone he's really attracted to. Driving away at 3 a.m., thinking about Brigid, he accidentally runs over a man. He recognizes him; it's Donal Cullen. His brother Vincent is "Dublin's number one thug." Can it get worse?
Massey wickedly entwines poor Paddy in an increasingly dark and droll, funny and frenetic, enjoyable Irish farce. --Tom Lavoie, former publisher