Unfortunately this was a big miss for me mainly due to the writing style.

Orla, our narrator, had a very specific tone all throughout that lacked emotion. Because of this, I found it extremely difficult to feel invested in Orla as a character/heroine. There were many exciting, coming-of-age themes presented in this novel, but Orla's disjointed voice didn't draw me in, leaving me with a lot to be desired.

The plot itself, what is written on the pages, has moments of exhilaration, and yet I was never moved by any sense of adventure.

I can appreciate what was intended with this, I just don't think it was executed properly.

Thank you to NetGalley and Seven Stories Press for an ARC in exchange for my honest review (:

I will have to wait until my library gets a physical copy of this book. The e-galley was a pdf (?) and the font was too small for me to read on my phone.

The short magical realism novel, The Gospel of Orla, by Irish poet Eoghan Walls, tells the story of Orla, hard-edged fourteen year old girl grieving the recent death of her mum, who has died of cancer. Her father, an alcoholic, is barely functional, leaving our protagonist to shoulder the household chores and the care of her younger sister, Lily. The night Orla decides to run away from home, she meets a stranger, Jesus, who has the power to resurrect dead creatures. With Jesus, Orla devises a plan to travel to Ireland, where her mother is buried, so that he may help her raise her mother from the dead, and the book follows their meandering road trip. Written in conversational, first-person perspective, the novel presents an interesting premise, as well as a intriguing, complex protagonist in Orla: her tough, rebellious, angry, shoplifting malcontent exterior conceals a vulnerable, sometimes even innocent self, wrestling with family dysfunction, teenage friendship angst, and the emotional fallout of her mother’s death. Sadly, however, the ending of this novel comes abruptly, leaving a lot of loose ends unresolved, and ultimately, deconstructing a story with potential.

The Gospel of Orla is a voice-driven, imaginative and surprisingly funny story about a fourteen year old girl struggling with the grief of losing her mother, a father who too often falls into a bottle to soothe his own pain, and a houseless man who calls himself Jesus and is either the second coming or something more akin to a vampire. When Orla enlists Jesus to run away with her to Ireland to raise her mother from the dead the plan goes as well as you might suspect. Orla is an original, as they say, and spending time in her angry, observant, and impulsive head was a real pleasure. As her misadventures ensue, there are deeply affecting scenes, themes and meditations on English racism and xenophobia, the necessity of pain and change in life, and the ease with which some adults and institutions write off troubled kids. A beautiful and accomplished debut novel that belongs alongside Sarah Moss's Ghost Wall.

Walls’s very peculiar novel begins with his 14-year-old protagonist, Orla McDevitt, attempting to make a nighttime escape from her troubled home. She wants to get to Liverpool and cross to Northern Ireland. Aunt Sinéad lives in Drumahoe and the girl’s mother was recently buried there. Orla’s mum died of esophageal cancer two months before, and the McDevitt house has been in chaos ever since. Mr. McDevitt drinks heavily, the house is squalid, and Orla is often left to care for her two-year-old sister. At school, she’s doing poorly. The teachers have cut her a fair bit of slack, but they know her home life is unstable. The family is on the radar of child welfare services, and the children may be taken into care. Fear, anger, and grief are fuelling Orla’s plan to run, but there may be other factors at play as well. Soon the girl’s hope for a miracle will become her main motivation for leaving home.

Orla is an unpleasant, even unsympathetic protagonist—foul-mouthed, egocentric, and a shoplifter. Her best friend, Jamie, was recently suspended from school after a bag of stolen iPhones was discovered in his locker. Orla’s missing him now because the ferry trip to Belfast can only be funded by selling what she’s nicked and it’s hard to work as a solo shoplifter when you’re used to being part of a dynamic “mad-dog” duo. Food for her trip must also be stolen. That, too, is something of a challenge, but Orla meets it.

Based on the elements I’ve described, I thought I was in for a realistic, somewhat gritty tale about an angry, grieving adolescent girl. I was wrong. This is a surreal narrative I could make little sense of.

Walls introduces an unexpected character—Jesus. He appears as filthy, foul-smelling homeless man, entirely naked but for a blanket. He’s come back to guide humanity, he says, having emerged from a box at the bottom of the sea where many bodies of the dead lie. He is now living in a derelict barn preparing for his mission, trying to find the right location to start, the place most in need of his message. He intercepts Orla as she attempts to make a late-night escape by bike. Why he does so is not clear. After scrabbling out of the canal into which she and her bike have fallen, the frightened girl is forced to return home.

A few nights later, her attacker—this strange man, Jesus—returns the bike to her home. Angry but curious, Orla follows him. This is when she discovers where he lives, who he claims to be, and the supernatural powers he possesses. <spoiler>She spies on him as he restores dead birds and other animals to life and wholeness, using his breath and his blood. There’s a catch, though: once restored, the creatures must remain within his orbit. If they’re exposed to the sun, they are vaporized, returning to the Father’s light. </spoiler> Having watched Jesus perform miracles, Orla decides that he needs to accompany her to Northern Ireland. <spoiler>She believes he can raise her mother from the dead.</spoiler> A fair bit of the novel details the challenges of Orla and Jesus’s journey, which becomes nightmarishly strange.<spoiler>Along the way Jesus tries to deliver his message of love and kindness in a pub, ends up being told to return to Somalia or Pakistan or whatever foreign parts he’s from. He’s tossed out, badly beaten, and left for dead. Orla subsequently buries him, hoping he’ll rise again. The girl then attends a circus, arranges for the now newly risen Jesus to make a living there—performing resurrections as a sideshow act, and then rides off on an elephant. In the end, her father finds her and she agrees to go for counselling.</spoiler>

I honestly cannot recall the last time I read such a weird book. When I began it, I wondered if I was getting a novelistic variation on the 1961 film <i>Whistle Down the Wind</i> in which three children discover a man in the family barn and believe him to be Jesus Christ. (He’s actually an escaped murderer.) Later, I wondered if the author was presenting a case of folie à deux, in which a grieving girl buys into the delusions of a schizophrenic man, possibly a refugee, claiming to be the Son of God. In the end, the only conclusion I could reach was that this was the story of a psychotic break.

The book ends very abruptly. I flipped ahead, thinking my digital advanced reading copy must be missing pages. Apparently not. I won’t lie: I was relieved. By that point, enough was enough.

I’m afraid I cannot recommend this novel. I’m surprised it was actually accepted for publication. Maybe I’m missing something. If someone figures out what that is, please let me know.

Thank you to Net Galley and the publisher for providing me with a free uncorrected proof for review.

Eoghan Walls' debut novel asks an age-old question: can we really ever get closure after losing someone we love? And it concludes with a resounding no. Orla, the teenage runaway, never makes it to Ireland. She does not get to make amends to anyone she has hurt on the way. She does not feel supported or loved by anyone and when she meets Jesus, he just becomes more baggage for her to carry, If not even Jesus has the power to make her feel better, then nothing will,

Some reviews on here are referring to the character of Jesus as a homeless man, however, throughout the novel Jesus brings dead animals back to life- there is a touch of strange magic in this book that I think is being glossed over. It was an enjoyable, quick read, with a tightly contained story that contains much larger themes.

I think that there's a lot to love about this novel. The voice of the narrator is so singular and unique, and the stream-of-consciousness narration style makes this a very quick, propulsive read. You really feel the urgency that Orla is feeling in her life, feeling trapped on all sides. I'm still not sure what to think about the "magical" ability of "Jesus" and the scene with the cat dying after Orla brings him home was quite disturbing, but I don't think it was handled in an overly graphic or sensationalized way. Orla is a really well-drawn character and you feel for all of her desperation, hopelessness, and complicated love for her family and friends. I have to say I thought that this ended very abruptly and that really didn't work well for me. You can definitely tell that the author is a poet as that often comes through in the prose in a really refreshing and effective way. I'd read more by this author.

I will be thinking about this short book for a very long time. The anger, confusion, pain, and loneliness Orla experiences following the death of her mother peeled back years of forgetting for me. I *was* Orla in 1984 when my mother died of cancer so immediately connected with this character. That feeling that everything will be okay if Orla can just get to Ireland - that’s part of the grieving process. This is a raw look at how grief tears people up and makes them do things they never would have done before the grief took hold. If you know, you know.

Huh. I really wanted to love this. I really did. But I just ended up waffling between wanting to throttle Orla and wanting to hug her.
Basically, this is the story of a teenager who lost her mom to cancer. Her father drinks away his sadness and her little sister is so young she doesn't see the family issues. Anyway, Orla decides she's going to Ireland, to her mom's family. One evening she runs into (literally) a homeless man who professes to be the Son of God. Yes, Jesus himself. And to be fair, he can perform miracles. So they go on this little adventure, that leaves both of them no better off than they were before. It's just odd. Luckily, it wasn't that long.

*Special thanks to NetGalley and Seven Stories Press for this e-arc.*

Jesus, take the wheel . . . or at least the handlebars.

Fourteen-year-old Orla has been unhappy at home ever since her mum died. Though she dotes on her baby sister, her dad's drinking is getting out of hand. She's in the midst of plotting her escape when she meets a homeless man who claims to be Jesus. Yes. The bloody Jesus Jesus. Her response? "Fuck off and leave me alone." But Orla discovers that the strange man has an unusual talent, and soon this girl, who's obviously never read Pet Sematary, and Jesus are on stolen bicycles headed for Liverpool where Orla plans for him to resurrect her mother, and Jesus hopes to be more popular than The Beatles.

I enjoyed this rather oddball read. Though it deals with some serious topics, there's a humorous, absurdist tone hovering in the background, and I hope it's not a spoiler to say that it ends on a melancholy but hopeful note. I'd recommend this to anyone looking for something unusual.

The Gospel of Orla was a well written, involving character study. By turns funny, sad, infuriating, and surprising, this book, like life itself, does not complete the story when the story comes to an end. I'm dissatisfied as a single reader, but feel that this is ripe for book club discussion.

DNF at 20%

The writing was stilted and did not feel authentic. The author very much operates on a tell not show basis and it just did not work. I also feel like the author did not capture the spirit of a grieving teenage girl and much of it felt based in stereotypes. Male authors need to do better when basing books around female characters, especially young girls.

Would not recommend.

Young teen dealing with her mother's death by plotting ways to run away, meets a homeless man who claims to be Jesus and they travel together. Strange story, likable at times, disturbing at times. It leaves a lot of questions unanswered but I think it ends on a hopeful note. I think. I may change my mind tomorrow. It does seem like the sort of story to pop back in your head and revisit.

Thank you NetGalley for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review.

I did not get the meaning behind this book and was hoping there would be an author’s note with some explanations. .

what a perfect book! Sweet captivating and fun I loved every minute of it and look forward to more from the author! Will read this for book club

Really lovely portrayal of girlhood and grief. The tightly written prose reminded me of another contemporary Irish author, Kieran Goddard. This is a quick read and the pace will keep you engaged. Thank you to seven stories for sending me an ARC!

This book is written as if by a 13-year-old, so rid yourself of the notion that this novel will have powerful, lyrical prose. It does not. It was still intriguing and at times incredibly weird. It's a short, fast read (unless you hate teen girl speak) that's at least worth picking up.

The Gospel of Orla is written in prose, but clearly by a poet. The lyrical language belies the delicate story of 14-year-old Orla struggling to find her footing after the death of her mother. She wants to be a rebellious twerp but can't help loving the other survivors in her family. With the help of a new person in her life and a splash of magical realism, she sets off on a journey to re-set her life

The Gospel of Orla by Eoghan Walls is like no other book you will ever read. It is about heartbreak (mother died), rebellion, and just trying to fit in. This has to be on TBR list if you haven't already read it.

Orla’s coming of age story is by turns heartbreaking, funny, incredibly odd but always compelling. The death of Orla’s mother feels like a character as Orla tries to run away from her father who uses alcohol for his grief. Running into a homeless man named Jesus adds more oddness along with religious overtones, some magical realism, and an amazingly good story.