David Duchovny’s novel, Holy Cow, is founded on a quirky idea, but its execution is slightly fumbled, resulting in a mixed-bag affair: funny without ever being laugh-out-loud; experimental, without being truly innovative. It’s got so much potential, but doesn’t quite grasp it.
Elsie Bovary is a cow, and a rather happy one at that. Life on the farm doesn’t have many thrills, but it’s comfortable, and fulfilling in its own way. Then, one night, as she and her best friend Mallory venture outside their gated commune, she sidles to the window of the farmhouse and discovers a horrible truth, one that rattles the very core of her world, via the screen of the ‘Box God’ – aka a television. Cows – her kind – are bred to be slaughtered. It hits her immediately: that’s why her mother, and so many other cows, have disappeared. Humans, clearly, cannot be trusted. She needs to escape – now. But where? The Box God provides the answer: India, duh, where cows are sacred, and Elsie will be treated with reverence.
And so, Elsie schemes the details: the when, the how. As she does so, she is approached by two characters: Shalom, a pig who has recently converted to Judaism and is determined to make it to Israel; and Tom, a Turkey, who wants to get to, well, Turkey. Together they form an unlikely trio, and when the time is right, they make their escape.
The novel reads as Elsie’s steam of consciousness. There’s a lot of winking at the reader, talking directly to the audience, and referring to her ‘editor.’ Holy Cow is loaded with jokes, but few warrant more than a minor chuckle. In that respect, Duchovny tries a little too hard to be constantly funny rather than finding a consistent peak. The same clumsiness occurs when he tries to nail down the novel’s message: that, as a global community we should unite and work together to foster mutual acceptance, cultural, religious and racial differences be damned. It’s ham-fisted rather than nuanced; a tighter edit could’ve massaged the theme less explicitly into the narrative.
Still, it’s refreshing to see a ‘celebrity author’ crafting something for pure entertainment rather than attempted literary merit. Duchovny’s Holy Cow brims with a zest rarely seen from his famous kin, and it’s sure to have its admirers. I count myself as one of them, despite some misgivings. Light-hearted and fun, I’m sure it’s unlike anything else I’ll read this year.
Simon McDonald 