Circling the Heavens
A short, unusually structured novel, Whole illustrates the path to spiritual growth in both its form and the story it tells.
Review by Liv Ross
Derek Updegraff’s short novel, Whole, is a story of fragments, told in fragments. The full narrative covers a little less than a year of our protagonist Joe’s life, and is intercut by strange short stories, some of which seem hardly connected to the main thread. Others seem to be excursions into other characters’ backgrounds or histories. Yet despite the novel’s fragmentary style and feel, by the end I felt as if I had been given a clear picture of the spiritual concept of life as an upward spiral.
Down through the centuries, religious teachers have described the pilgrimage of life as an upward spiral. Rather than a straight line with clear demarcations of progress, or an endless circle with no destination, the spiral captures both the forward momentum of sanctification and the cyclical nature of time. Even within a single human life, events can seem to repeat themselves, and even the best of men may be dismayed to find themselves at seemingly the same low point they thought was far behind them. The Church Fathers offer comfort for this predicament, pointing out that the low points for the faithful pilgrim are not returns to the exact same spot. It is not simple turning of the wheel, but the downward dip of the spiral. Though similar to the prior experience, this spot is a little further on the road, a little deeper into the spiritual journey, and, most hopefully, a little higher on the road to heaven.
Whole begins with the beginning of the downward turn for Joe’s spiral: he receives a text from his girlfriend, Ashley, asking to talk. While Joe tries to intuit some context in the brief text (while driving), he strikes a homeless man named Ronnie who was riding a bicycle, and he is briefly distracted from his worry about what might be up with Ashley by the need to take care of Ronnie. He waits with Ronnie until an ambulance arrives, then takes him to buy some supplies and a new bicycle before returning home in time to get cleaned up and make his date with Ashley. His concern about her text returns, but over the course of the evening, she never brings it up, and Joe decides not to remind her.
The novel, told in a first-person, stream-of-consciousness prose, follows Joe from those events as he navigates his daily life. One gets the sense that Joe was completely content and aimless before the accident. He has worked for a few years at a sandwich shop, with no real goal of pursuing a higher or more lucrative job. He has been content with his apartment, rented, small, and sparely furnished. Now, he begins to be more focused, perhaps even driven, as he continues his romantic pursuit of Ashley. His has been the life of a young single man, but he begins to think towards building something that he can share with a family. He doesn’t abandon all of his old aimless habits, still wandering through town on a whim at times, or taking rides on a bus solely to have conversations with other passengers. However, many of his thoughts and actions increasingly hinge upon Ashley and what would bring him into closer relationship with her.
Thus, Joe begins to plan and to become a participant in his life, instead of just observing it as it passes him by. Where his interactions with Ronnie or the bus passengers seemed to come from a sort of disconnected good-naturedness, he is truly interested in Ashley and works to get to know her. He finds her to be warm, beautiful, passionate, and they share an interest in writing—she in poetry and he in short fiction. Ashley, a professor and Midwest transplant to this stretch of California desert, is feeling adrift and responds warmly to Joe’s pursuit. When Joe becomes certain that she is as attached to him as he is to her, his thoughts turn towards engagement. He is on an upward turn.
The events of the beginning are mirrored at the end, but with a difference.
Joe plans a trip to the beach, secretly buying a ring in case an opportunity to propose presents itself. But it is on this trip that Ashley finally tells Joe why she had asked to talk on the day of the accident: She had applied to a teaching position at a college in Minnesota, and she was offered the job. She tells him that she has accepted and will soon be leaving. She had texted to tell him on the day of the accident, but she couldn’t make herself bring it up. As time went on, their relationship kept going so well that she didn’t want to end it. Deeply upset, Joe sends her back home with the car and flees to the ocean. He leaps in, fully clothed, and swims away. This is a beach he has visited; he has sheltered and found rest on its sands before. This time, though, rest and shelter elude him, and eventually he hires a car to take him home late in the evening.
The purpose and determination Joe has gained from pursuing Ashley throughout the novel remains, but he becomes confused about what path to pursue. Should he follow Ashley to Michigan, or should he instead try to rekindle a long-ended relationship with an ex who has reappeared?
The novel ends with a new text from Ashley, asking to talk, and a second encounter with Ronnie. The events of the beginning are mirrored at the end, but with a difference: Joe is not at the same point as he was when the novel started. Before, he was drifting, aimless. Now, he is purposeful and searching. He is confused about his path, a state which can seem very similar to aimlessness, but his acknowledgment of needing to pursue a path places him further and higher on his journey around the spiral. The consequence of spiritual progress means that his decisions and actions will have deeper meaning and higher consequences, for himself and for these people that he has closely interacted with over the past year. The story ends by coming together with a sense of one cycle being completed, and the next about to begin.
At the outset, I struggled to pin down this strange little novel. The events unfold in quick, flashbulb-like bursts, made almost dreamlike by Joe’s stream-of-consciousness style narration. The reader is limited completely to how Joe sees and reacts to the events unfolding, and there are moments when the reader may question how accurately Joe is perceiving what is going on. The addition of those seemingly unrelated short stories interwoven with the main chapters heighten the sense of dreamy unreality. Joe mentions early on that he is a writer when discussing his new relationship with Ashley. It is implied that the stories are ones he has written. Some seem to have nothing to do with the narrative of his life. Others could be memories, or dreams that he recalls. Still others could be accounts of the histories of the people he has met. At least one seems to concern the ex-girlfriend who reappears in his life. These could be complete fictions, or they could be embellished true stories. It’s difficult to tell. By the end, it doesn’t really matter. The fragmented stories that Joe tells and the story he lives become entwined into something whole, a complete loop that readies him for the next trip around the spiral.
Liv Ross is an urban monk, a poet, a birder, and a student of Christian Spirituality. She has been published in Loft Books, The Blue Daisies Journal, The Way Back To Ourselves, Silence and Starsong, Vessels of Light and VoeglinView.
Whole was published by Slant Books on July 16, 2024. Fare Forward appreciates their provision of a copy to our reviewer. You can purchase a copy from the publisher here.
