Oliver Pepper's Pickle
Boston Globe "Pick o the Week" the novel, "Oliver Pepper's Pickle" 10/23/11"Caitlin  Doggart of Where the Sidewalk Ends Bookstore in Chatham recommends  Oliver Pepper’s Pickle" by John C. Picardi (Camel): "In this vibrant,  funny, and heartfelt novel, a self-described ‘boring’ 36-year-old  ‘privileged white man’ named Oliver Pepper endures a stretch of failures  before he’s hired as a substitute teacher in a violent New York City  middle school. His new job begins as a way to catch the eye of the sexy  principal but becomes an unexpected boost to Mr. Pepper as he influences  his students in surprising ways." Boston Globe October 23, 2011"Oliver Pepper's Pickleis the story of a man who bellies up to the bar of self-loathing self-destructiveness and is pulled instead, in spite of himself, into a brave new world--friends emerging from closets, fish-sauce-flavored Thanksgivings, special-needs ghetto kids at the Met, growing new sets of balls ..."It's a touching love story that will make you spit out your food laughing when you least expect it. John C. Picardi is an original."--Kate Christensen, author ofIn The Drink,Jeremy Thrane,The Epicure's Lament,The Great Man,Trouble,The Astral. and Winner of the 2008 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction."Picardi has created a delicate yet emotional story that sneaks up on you like a lovely relationship, evolving slowly and gracefully, 'peppered' with hope and despair, and above all, humanity. Picardi reveals his characters so subtly, so artfully, that suddenly you realize they are a part of your family. I loved this book."--Steven Cooper, Author ofDeadlineandSaving Valencia"Oliver Pepper is the teacher you always wanted: irreverent, kind, outrageous, smart, eager to wake you up to the world"--Paul Lisicky, Author ofLawnboyandThe Burning House"In this comic, compelling and provocative novel, John C. Picardi--and his hapless hero--dare to raise a 'forbidden shade' on modern-day manhood. Picardi's tale of Pepper's 'Pickle' is as crisp, tart and sneakily sweet as a classic dill. Picardi loves his wayward characters and he masterfully muscles us into loving them too."--Elizabeth Searle, Author ofCelebrities In DisgraceandTonya & Nancy: The Rock Opera"Oliver Pepper's Pickleis a ruefully humorous, fast-paced, and insightful read. Picardi's comic gifts are formidable, and he has plenty to tell us about failure, heartbreak, love, and, finally, recovery."--John Fulton, author ofRetributionandMore Than EnoughSept/Oct 2011 — ForeWord ReviewThe  theme of an anti-hero confronting his personal demons through  self-exploration and repeated failure is a familiar one: it requires  little searching to find a book or film that represents any number of  flawed (yet somewhat likable) characters as they bumble through a series  of failing relationships, encounters with drugs and alcohol, reluctant  parenthoods, destroyed friendships . . . to at last find a way to be a  better man.Oliver Pepper's Pickle, with its alcoholic, sexually  stunted narrator, fits snugly into this compendium. Oliver Pepper's  decline and fall, and his subsequent recovery, is the basis of this  humorous, sometimes rambling work of fiction by John C. Picardi. Oliver  Pepper is a man who has become incapable of living his life. He is  highly intelligent, and utterly wounded by his past.In the  opening chapter, Pepper's wife is leaving him, and it goes downhill from  there. As she packs her things, she confesses to having a lover, to  being stunted by their marriage, and to believing he is an alcoholic.  Soon after, he discovers she engaged in a series of recurring, vigorous  sexual encounters with his friends. Thus we meet our anti-hero Pepper, a  young prep school professor with a drinking problem (that he denies  even while drinking in his classrooms) and a total inability to  emotionally relate to adult males, adult females, children, and a  variety of daily occurrences. Indeed, soon he loses his job, winds up in  AA, and discovers another frightful secret about his wife. When the  book is not making you snicker, it will bite.Alternately  cringe-inducing (as when Pepper stumbles upon his wife's sexy chats with  her lovers) and hilarious (same scene), the novel delves into Pepper's  own painful confrontation with manhood—plus that of his deceased father  and that of an erstwhile drinking buddy. The journey is meticulously  catalogued through Pepper's interactions with other people, and  especially with a particular self-help book he constantly refers to  (Castration of the 20th Century Man: How to Grow a New Set for the 21st  Century)—but don't expect a concrete answer in the end. Perhaps  Picardi's message is that self-exploration is enough, or, in the words  of Pepper's father, ". . . in every living thing there's a little light,  like a flame, and if we see it going out, we have to try to keep it  lit. We have to keep the blaze of life going."At times Picardi  moves through his plot material as if impatient to be through with it,  before settling again on a scene and dialogue, yet overall, the book has  a comfortable, compelling rhythm. It's an interesting one-man study of  how parents and childhood experiences can have an enduring affect on  later lives, and how it's possible for even the most distorted of human  beings to find salvation in self-examination and hope for the future.An amusing read, Oliver Pepper's Pickle serves up both extremely light and extremely heavy moments until the very end.