Flabbergasted by Ray Blackston

First published: Grand Rapids, Mich.: Fleming H. Revell, 2003

Genre(s): Novel

Subgenre(s): Humor; romance; satire; stories

Core issue(s): Conversion; friendship; love; marriage

Principal characters

• Jay Jarvis, the protagonist, a twenty-seven-year-old stockbroker
• Allie Kyle, a missionary on furlough
• Steve Cole, Jay’s friend
• Darcy Yeager, the tall, blond driver of a lime-green classic Cadillac convertible
• Ransom Delaney, a surfer and friend of Jay and Steve
• Beatrice Dean, an elderly client of Jay
• Stanley Rhone, a theologically minded member of the singles group
• Lydia Hutto, a short, red-haired member of the singles group
• The Reverend Asbury Smoak, the elderly pastor of Pawleys Island Baptist Church, a fishing enthusiast
• Maurice Evans, the janitor at North Hills Presbyterian Church
• Alexis Demoss, another member of the singles group
• The Reverend Tyrus Williams, a guest preacher at North Hills Presbyterian Church

Overview

Ray Blackston’s debut novel, Flabbergasted, is set in the contemporary southern United States. Its prologue is told in a voice the reader later learns to be that of twenty-seven-year-old stockbroker Jay Jarvis, the novel’s protagonist, and introduces the novel’s depiction of Jay’s life-changing experiences. The rest of the story is told in Jay’s voice.

“Act 1” opens with Jay going to church to meet single women. He meets Lydia Hutto, Stanley Rhone, and Steve Cole but is most intrigued by Allie Kyle. He volunteers to help with an upcoming Memorial Day beach trip for singles when he learns that she is helping with that event. The rest of “Act 1” is dedicated to this trip, during which Jay becomes friends with Steve and Ransom Delaney, reels in and pets a shark with the Reverend Asbury Smoak, and gets to know Allie. Allie both intrigues and puzzles Jay, and “Act 1” ends with Jay’s realization, “I may want what you have . . . that contentment, that whatever it is that makes you happier than everyone else.”

“Act 2” begins the following August. Allie returns to Ecuador, where she is a missionary, and Jay has returned to his job, missing her, feeling a bit disgruntled that she left and not comfortable with his stockbroker lifestyle. Jay attends church only occasionally and is still anxious not to become too enmeshed in it, sitting in “pew number twenty-three . . . twenty-two was way too close to the front.” Nevertheless, he has met his closest friends through church. Jay corresponds with Allie, and begins attending a men’s group. He goes to dinner with Alexis, from whom he is stunned to learn that, like men, single women church-hop looking for dates and also have organized an e-mail list. Jay also learns that he is not interested in a “Plan B” girl; he remains interested in Allie. Despite his growing ambivalence about his work, Jay does it well; he is interviewed for a promotion, which would require relocating to New York City. It would be a corporate step up, but Jay seems uneasy. Big Apple culture is jarringly different from that of the South, and he is still circling the question of where his interest in Allie could or should lead.

Meanwhile, the men’s group has decided to take on a community service project, and Jay suggests that they help repair Asbury’s dilapidated ancestral home. When the group arrives, they discover that Asbury has been offered a fishing boat in exchange for the property. This turn of events, if somewhat contrived, has an important role in advancing the larger plot: Jay tumbles from it and wakes in a hospital contemplating his mortality. Later Jay responds incognito to a personal ad posted by Allie, and toward the end of their “instant message” conversation he reveals both who he is and that he has become a Christian. “Act 2” ends with Jay having accepted the promotion and readying himself to move to New York.

“Act 3” begins with Jay postponing his new job for a week and heading for Ecuador to visit Allie. However, Jay decides to stay. It is likely Jay makes this choice more because he wants to be with Allie than that he feels a clear call to become a missionary, but Jay is a new believer, sorting out as he goes along his attraction to Allie and to the God he has met through her. By the end of the book, Jay realizes how much more meaningful the life he has begun in Ecuador is than the one he gave up:

I did not know if my soul would grow old somewhere south of Colombia, South America, or Columbus, South Carolina. . . . [I]n God’s shadow I had been dazzled by the detour, amazed at the fraternity, and flabbergasted by the depth that comes from simplicity, from serving in a village that was shabby, green, and pulsing with life.

Christian Themes

Blackston’s handling of the mechanics of novel writing are exemplary for a first book. His use of language is often striking:

Exhaust fumes enveloped us and billboards hailed us, advertising everything from T-shirts to tanning oil. They were countless, colorful, and staggering in height, each straining for attention like pageant contestants with too much rouge.

The formula of a “normal guy” surrounded by an ensemble of quirky characters works well. Jay is consistently surprised by the crowd to which he has become attached—a group of unusual, well-drawn characters that engage and retain the reader’s interest. Blackston’s characterization of men tends to be stronger than his characterization of women. Allie in particular is a more convincing character in the later books of the trilogy (A Delirious Summer, 2004, and Lost in Rooville, 2005), in which her humanity is more fully developed; here, her plot role as the girl so good that Jay comes to know God through her is a bit constraining, but Blackston’s detailed characterization of men is unusually good, especially for contemporary Christian fiction, and is a welcome addition to it.

Conversion is the novel’s core concern, and Blackston handles Jay’s increasing interest in God and eventual acceptance of Christianity particularly well. There is a temptation to overdramatize a moment of such importance, but the novel shows wise restraint. The presentation of Jay’s movement from a church-wary stockbroker trolling for girls to a rookie missionary is central to other of the novel’s Christian themes, as well. Jay slowly comes to recognize the inherent materialism of his profession, an insight clearly meant for a wider audience.

This maturation process also contributes to the novel’s presentation of Christians as real people. Through Jay’s uninitiated perspective, Blackston debunks stereotypes of Christians. Christians get speeding tickets, think about sex, become snippy with one another, fish, worry about dating, and vary in the strength of their commitment to God. With a penchant for throwing food, even Allie is not uniformly good, although this tendency is more persuasive on a second read; on a first read, this character trait seems somewhat contrived, as though to make Allie seem not too good; her wheedling the fish filet from Asbury with a story about digestive distress on the mission field is more immediately persuasive.

Stanley Rhode is closest to a stereotypical Bible Belt Christian. He is a bit uptight, likes to talk about theological issues using big words, admonishes Jay about having a “quiet time” (Jay’s reaction is one of the novel’s most amusing moments), and refuses to dispense candy on Halloween because of its diabolic connotations. The main characters are clearly uncomfortable with Stanley, do not find him much fun, and do not wish to emulate his type of Christianity, but Stanley is not the novel’s the bad guy. It is Stanley who, consistent with his often overbearing sense of responsibility, calls the Beach Patrol and rescues Jay and Allie when they drift too far out to sea. Despite himself, Jay is grateful. The novel suggests that even Christians with little in common and who find one another abrasive can and should get along—because they are Christians.

The tone of the novel is light and humorous, and its consideration of its core themes happens within that context. It satirizes Stanley’s overzealousness and the potentially problematic practice of church-hopping to find dates, but the satire here is gentle and good-natured, whereas the novel’s critique of materialism is more seriously meant.

Sources for Further Study

Blackston, Ray. A Delirious Summer. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Fleming H. Revell, 2004. A sequel to Flabbergasted. On the advice of one of his students (Jay Jarvis), Spanish-language teacher Neil Rucker takes his furlough in Greenville, South Carolina, seeking to end his months-long dating dry spell.

Blackston, Ray. Lost in Rooville. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Fleming H. Revell, 2005. The third in the trilogy formed by Flabbergasted and A Delirious Summer. Jay Jarvis has a plan: get his girlfriend Allie to Australia, find an unforgettable spot, and propose.

Blackston, Ray. Web site. http://www.rayblackston.com. Blackston’s official Web site offers more information about him and his books.

Butler, Tamara. “Flabbergasted.” Library Journal, June 1, 2003. A brief review of the novel.

Parker, Mike. “Exploring the Absurdities of Dating.” BookPage, May, 2003. http://www.bookpage.com. A review of Flabbergasted.