As author Starbuck O’Dwyer flawlessly depicts, Goliath Gets Up is about a rag-tag bunch of friends-by-circumstance who, led by a man who might have been a dragon in a previous life, decide they must do something important in order to change their lives.
The friends actually have a formal meeting about what that impressive thing could be, and they weigh the pros and cons of each suggestion. This lovable group may not know what it is they should do, but they know it must be big.
One strange turn leads to another, and the group decides the first step would be to get the Oscars (yes, the Awards) to relocate to Rochester. As that plan begins to melt like sugar in a puddle, the next plan is naturally to throw themselves off the town’s waterfall as part protest, part accomplishment.
The absolute delight of this book comes from the characters and their conversations with each other. Some of the dialogue our hapless main character endures is side-splitting, while still as confusing for us as for him. The resolution is in no way contrite or fixed, but is very natural and endearing.
The setting of the story is so realistic in its vivid descriptions of locale that I had to do some research to find out if it was fiction or not. Of course, if Rochester, New York, ever actually had citizens named Nubby, Dragon, and Big Nasty, then Google let me down.
If this book has a flaw, it is that it ends far too soon for the readers who have rooted for these underdogs from page one. Goliath Gets Up is a delightful read in which you find yourself shamelessly and boisterously cheering for the most outrageous band of misfits to ever have a dream.
Reviewed by Mercy Pilkington for IndieReader