Opening with a wonderfully comic set piece in which a drunk daughter almost runs over her even drunker father after he’s wandered off into the night chasing the sound of the voice of his dead son, William Jack Sibley’s HERE WE GO LOOP DE LOOP is an entertaining, and very funny, novel set in the imaginary Texas town of Rita Blanca. Ostensibly a love story, in which a woman is in love with a man who is in love with a different man, at every turn Sibley breathes joyous life into a world that is sometimes strange and sometimes off-kilter but always recognizably real. Humorously dealing with serious issues, and subjects here range from sexual identity to patriotism, is always a difficult task but Sibley’s skill as a prose writer and his ability to conjure believable and simultaneously funny dialogue allow him to deliver a comic tour de force that also functions as astute social satire and cultural commentary.

Laugh out loud moments are frequent often due to Sibley’s ear for the wicked one-liners that trip easily from the tongues of his well defined characters who are so well drawn it is easy to imagine their lives when they are not on the page. Though the dialogue is the driving force behind the narrative, Sibley also has the knack of being able to drop in humorous asides seemingly on a whim, such as when the old timers at The Dusty Rose flower shop bemoan the fact that they have no customers, real or virtual, thanks in part to being stuck with a homepage that blasts out “Welcome To The Jungle” courtesy of their inept, now ostracized, web designer. The streets of the town of Rita Blanca seem rich with stories and the interlinking of its characters and their place in its history have the makings of a Fargo-esque long form television show or a series of novels. By the final page the reader will be sad to leave town and eager to return. One can only hope Sibley will want to revisit his creation in the future.

Aside from being a comic tour de force, HERE WE GO LOOP DE LOOP also offers contemplative moments focusing on real human emotions like life and death and love and loss. That Sibley can tug at the heart at the same time as making the reader laugh is testament to his skills. Don’t be fooled by the jokes, Sibley is a serious talent.

~Kent Lane for IndieReader