The Annunciation of Francesca Dunn

January 19, 2004
A fleeting cult of the Virgin Mary springs up around a Boulder, Colo., teenager serving meals to the homeless in Hallowell's spacey, lightweight debut. Francesca Dunn is a fairly ordinary eighth-grader at a local school for kids who have emotional problems—in Francesca's case, an eating disorder after the divorce of her scientist parents. She and her best girlfriend, Sid, who cuts herself and has a drunken, lonely mother needing sympathy and money, work at Ronnie's Café helping out with meals for the homeless, where a delusional transient named Chester is seized suddenly with the fantasy that Francesca is the embodiment of the Virgin and can bless the sick. The idea catches on alarmingly, attracting zealots and sufferers who camp in droves around Francesca's house. In brief chapters, four characters comment on the unfolding drama: Chester, who truly believes in Francesca's powers and feels grateful to serve as her bodyguard and protector; Sid, who is by turns admiring and resentful of her friend, and ultimately trades on their friendship for cash; Anne, Francesca's mother, a divorced paleobotanist whose traveling allows others to step in and take advantage of the growing frenzy around her daughter; and Francesca herself, a stately third-person presence willing to do what is expected of her. The conceit is snappy, and the narrative moves effortlessly, but the novel lacks a genuine sense of the spiritual lives of its characters. Instead of exploring the intricacies and ambiguities of religious faith and revelation, Hallowell builds her story on platitudinous sound bites.