Want to run a fool's errand? Ask someone to explain their infatuation with a person who is wrong for them in every way, and wait for a logical answer. One could start by asking the trio that headlines No Way Home, T.C. Boyle's entertainingly cynical novel about a love triangle that quickly turns bloodthirsty. Terrence Tully, better known as Terry, is a single and sleep-deprived resident at a Los Angeles-area hospital. He receives a call from Nevada informing him that his widowed mother has died. He drives out there to arrange her affairs and claim ownership of her house and dog. Once there, he meets Bethany, a hospital receptionist who has broken up with her boyfriend and brushes hair off her face during a meal together "with the hand that clutched the steak knife." After she and Terry have sex in his mother's house, she asks if she can live there. Terry says no. She moves in anyway, and tells people she's Terry's fiancée.
Boyle (San Miguel; The Harder They Come) makes a satisfyingly unnerving narrative edgier by introducing Jesse, Bethany's ex-boyfriend, an eighth-grade teacher prone to stealing her paychecks. He begins stalking Bethany when he learns she's dating a doctor. The novel gets even creepier from there. In a seeming paradox, however, it also grows more nuanced, as Boyle shows the fragility of reason when it comes to romance. Readers who appreciate Boyle's unparalleled skill at serving up benighted reprobates will find much to feast upon in this excellent work. --Michael Magras, freelance book reviewer