Mallory’s Manly Methods

April 15, 2022

Kirkus Reviews

Keech presents a comedic novel about a blundering young professional.

Kevin Mallory doesn’t have a lot going for him. He can’t hold a job for long, he is useless around a firearm, his dating prospects are bleak, and he certainly can’t cook. When the reader meets Kevin, he at least has his own efficiency apartment and people that want to get to know him. He works in the call center for a company called UniCast Cable and spends most of his day doing everything he can to not help customers.

 Although his poor performance verges on getting him fired, something makes him rethink his future. After developing an interest in his co-worker Nell, Kevin joins Nell’s beloved company “Cheer Committee,” but he still has a long way to go to melt her heart. Meanwhile, he strikes up a friendship with his neighbor Thomas, a budding track star who, unlike Kevin, comes from a stable and caring family. When Thomas winds up in trouble, Kevin wants to help him even if it requires him to make some unethical – if downright ludicrous – decisions.

At the outset, Kevin can seem a little too fantastical even for such a free-wheeling story – he hates people who walk fast, owns a pet ferret for dubious reasons, and wears colored beads on his facial hair. Yet, as the story progresses, he manages to become someone worth rooting for. Even if he does, at one point, steal someone’s cat, he goes out of his way to care for the “beautiful” creature. And he is not without his hard-won realizations. After he takes to wearing a suit, he comes to realize, “an old, worn suit was worse than no suit at all.” So how will this individual who is “a lifelong avoider of consequences, a violator of common standards of decency” ever manage to grow? The narrative hits on some tough topics like police brutality, yet it maintains a fun tone throughout. Love or hate Kevin (and the reader may find themselves doing both at the same time), this quest for maturity becomes oddly endearing.

An exceedingly kooky protagonist drives this touching, silly adventure.