When his will is read, everyone’s stunned by the revelation that he’s left the chapel to Holly to run. The book opens on the funeral for Holly’s beloved Grandpa Jim. Ironically, Leavitt’s fiction made a real place seem less fictional to me. Holly’s attempts to make Dax love Vegas made me want to visit it too. For her, it’s not casinos and “what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.” There are some ways in which it’s very much not any other place, but it’s also a much more beautiful portrayal than I’ve ever seen. In this case, though, Vegas is Holly’s hometown. I’ve never been and don’t have much interest in going, since the casinos and shit I’ve seen in the movies don’t really interest me. The book is both very Vegas-focused and not at all like I expected something set in Vegas to be. The Chapel Wars takes place in Las Vegas, but in a way that was totally new to me. I did really love her thing with counting and her mathematical predictions of marriages’ success. Holly doesn’t do this stuff often, but it really stood out to me as strange since she’s of a more mathematical mind most of the time. I’m amused, but also a bit confused again. “'If hate were a person, we’d be second cousins.'” Seriously? What does that even mean? Also, poor LA. "If looks were America and ugly was Los Angeles, this boy was comfortably Kentucky. Part of my struggle at the start was that Holly has a few really odd descriptions, which I can’t help not sharing so here you go: I can’t really explain why I wasn’t feeling all the feels it seems as though I should have been. This did result in a lack of emotional connection, but, by the end, I loved this book in a very intellectual way. The voice is unique, but not in a way that jumped off the page for me. The Chapel Wars took a bit of time to grab me, I’ll admit. The short version is that The Chapel Wars turned out to be quite fantastic. The time came, though, when I had to read this book, mostly because I checked it out of the library and then proceeded to rack up $1.20 in fines (oops), so obviously I had to at least read it now that I was paying money for it. I wasn’t sure, not having heard all that much buzz about Leavitt’s books.
She told me over and over to read The Chapel Wars.
For more reviews, gifs, Cover Snark and more, visit A Reader of Fictions.ĭahlia Adler, Recing ball and author extraordinaire (Behind the Scenes/Last Will and Testament/Under the Lights), wins again.
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