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Book Reviews -
Women's Health and Psychology
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Written by Jennifer Thompson
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 FBI Girl: How I Learned to Crack My Father's Code, by Maura Conlon-McIvor
FBI Girl
introduces us to seven-year-old Maura Conlon, Nancy Drew fan, one of
four children, with a former beauty queen for a mother and an FBI
Special Agent for a father. This is her story about growing up in Los
Angeles in the 60's while her father worked for the FBI during the
Hoover era.
Ms. Conlon-McIvor does a beautiful
job of writing a memoir that reads like fiction. She writes each
chapter from the point of view of herself at that age. When Maura is
seven years old, we read the story through a seven-year-old's eyes.
When she's in high school, we get a more mature narrator. This adds so
richly to the plot, as the reader tries to get a handle on what's
really going on in the Conlon family as baby #5, Joe Jr., arrives on
the scene.
Joe Conlon, Sr. is a man of few words, and Maura begins to believe that
her father is constantly communicating in code, and if she can just
break that code she'll finally understand her dad. Maura starts keeping
a notebook filled with observations from around the neighborhood,
including strange license plates. We might not all have grown up with
Special Agent fathers, but I think it's a safe bet that many of us grew
up with fathers who were men of action and perhaps a little short on
words.
Life in the Conlon family becomes complicated when Joe, Jr. is born
with Down's Syndrome. In a time when people would say things like, "I'm
so sorry" to Maura's parents, Joe and Mary Conlon not only welcomed
their son and found joy in him unlike any other, they raised money to
help others like him. Joe Sr. may be a mystery to Maura, but his love
for Joe Jr., comes through loud and clear. Tragedy strikes the family
near the end of the book as a cherished relative is murdered, bringing
them together yet again.
I found myself unable to put this book down and unwilling to hold back
the tears that inevitably came to my eyes as I read about Maura's
struggles to get along in Catholic school as a painfully shy young
girl, figure out her family and what her parents were really telling
each other and themselves, and solve the mystery of just where her own
talents might lay. Ms. Conlon-McIvor hints in the epilogue that she may
have another story to share about visiting her family's homeland, and
if she does indeed write that story I'll be among the first to pluck it
from the bookstore shelves.
From the dust jacket:
Bathed in luminous nostalgia, resonating with hilarious and painful
memories, FBI Girl is the coming-of-age story of a highly-imaginative
girl and a passionate homage to family bonds, the trials that test
them, and the triumphs that make them stronger.
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