With its thrilling pace and conscientious message, The Retributionist achieves its purpose of bringing awareness to the issue of animal cruelty. The hWith its thrilling pace and conscientious message, The Retributionist achieves its purpose of bringing awareness to the issue of animal cruelty. The hero of this page-turning novel is Jack Steele, a former Marine. He has suffered the tragic loss of his fiancé, and to keep her memory alive as an animal advocate, Jack devises a method of exacting payback against ruthless animal abusers.
Jack’s purpose, however, is not strictly fulfilling revenge. He wants his acts of retribution to initiate news in the press and serve as a catalyst for enacting change in society. Jack is selective and meticulous in picking targets without trying to kill those who think nothing of an innocent animal’s death. Rather, he intends to inflict hurt and shame on abusers and hopefully awaken their conscience.
Jack’s goal is justice, and A. Wylderich shows how protection for animals is possible by offering us a compelling story that exposes crimes against innocent beings with the intent to galvanize us to think twice about our own actions. With a nice balance of smooth prose, a few side stories, and a clever twist of an ending, The Retributionist portrays a vigilante hero unlike any other....more
Gardiner composes tales in a style that is simple to the point of lacking depth and literary flair. He achieves a few touching moments, but little staGardiner composes tales in a style that is simple to the point of lacking depth and literary flair. He achieves a few touching moments, but little stands out as overly memorable. These stories amount to sitcom reading: you finish them, say okay, and quickly forget about them. “Ordinary” may be the best way to describe North of Ordinary. ...more
With her gripping debut novel Priceless, Lulu Zhang maintains an impressive degree of suspense in a cautionary story of deceit, survival, and forgivenWith her gripping debut novel Priceless, Lulu Zhang maintains an impressive degree of suspense in a cautionary story of deceit, survival, and forgiveness.
Growing up in China, Lucy has always been a top student and a good daughter until thirteen when her obsession with the Internet lures her into exploring risky sites. Her beloved father decides to send Lucy to live with her mother in America, where Lucy’s life becomes more confused and overwhelmed with her inability to fit in.
Heading off to college without much confidence or direction, Lucy falls deeper into a web of dangers. The allure of materialism leads her first to working for an “arrangement” service, and then unknowingly she finds herself trapped in a series of relationships that aren’t what they seem.
Zhang not only keeps the heart-pounding suspense ramped up, but she creates an atmosphere of tantalizing mystery and dread where Lucy’s experiences leave her unable escape the pull of her desires. How can she ever recover from the anguish of betrayal?
Zhang shows real skill in delivering a frightening story that could have gone in many directions. Its power emerges in the strength and healing Lucy finds through an embrace of both Christianity and Taoism.
The novel’s smooth prose enables a rapid plot to unfold. Zhang also captures Lucy’s inner turmoil to endure the many horrors she must navigate until she’s given a second chance through her ability to forgive those who wronged her.
In confronting the criminal underworld of human trafficking, Zhang’s novel is more than a story of one young woman’s near disappearance into submission as a “waitress.” It’s a story that empowers anyone who has ever felt trapped to fight back and never abandon their dignity. ...more
In tackling the immensity of American slavery and its aftermath, Ours by Phillip B. Williams is ambitious in its epic scope. It’s also sustained by prIn tackling the immensity of American slavery and its aftermath, Ours by Phillip B. Williams is ambitious in its epic scope. It’s also sustained by prose seeking to be profoundly lyrical and original, which it can be, but not in the magical way Toni Morrison or Cormac McCarthy can turn a phrase or offer a description.
The characters in Ours are mysterious, represented most by the central figure of the narrative, a woman named Saint who wields sorcery powers. Many of the other characters throughout the sprawling narrative, however, are often elusive and transitory in their function to the point of what is the purpose of each.
What the narrative lacks is a focused, cohesive plot. It wants to be everything and is instead a little bit too much of a lot to take in. With such epic reach, it often felt like it didn’t have great depth, but rather endless anecdotes and incidents, a lot to look at like touring around a castle, but the grandeur becomes tedious. Its length fizzled under the grandness of its flimsy plot.
I saw similarities between Ours and Edward P. Jones’s often-forgotten, Pulitzer-winning novel of slavery The Known World. Jones captures a picturesque world through an assortment of interweaving narratives, but his vision of mosaic parts assembled with more memorable impact than Williams’s world....more
Since its publication in 1955, O’Connor’s collection of ten stories has withstood time to secure its place as an American classic. This edition includSince its publication in 1955, O’Connor’s collection of ten stories has withstood time to secure its place as an American classic. This edition includes an introduction from the formidable contemporary novelist Lauren Groff, who praises the book as a vital work that she returns to often. It’s hard not to forget some of the shocking incidents O’Connor leaves us with, but for me the overall impact of the stories came off underwhelming and forgettable in the sense that I have no reason for needing to return to them.
No doubt the title piece “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” is cruel and harrowing with its brutality, yet it’s also predictable and somewhat anticlimactic because the foreshadowing early in the story is blatantly obvious of how the old woman will meet her fate at the hands of The Misfit. The story’s real power lies in its ability to offer a scenario of coincidence to examine the human inclination towards the use of violence.
Other stories, however, I thought were better. “The River” generates suspense leading up to a conclusion that hits with sadness and shock at the preventable tragedy. “The Life You Save May Be Your Own” depicts how easily misconceptions can lead to betrayal. “The Artificial N--ger” shows how racism and hatred are passed down and ingrained generation to generation. But perhaps the best piece in the book is “A Circle in the Fire.” It examines the shamefulness of patronizing those in need and the casualness of flaunting economic supremacy. Its vengeful ending leaves much to ponder.
As for the other five stories, I found them oftentimes tedious to the point of having a hard time maintaining focus to finish them. Although O’Connor is skilled at descriptions, particularly those of character traits and morality, her prose can be declarative and rambling more often than explosive and illuminating. Her other fetish is with describing skies and sunsets, and I was quite enamored with some of the brilliant images she conjures. Having read this classic that I’ve long put aside, it’s now fleeting fast from my memory. ...more
Sandra Cisneros’s story collection Woman Hollering Creek commanded my attention with its mythological flair throughout and its enthralling details. HeSandra Cisneros’s story collection Woman Hollering Creek commanded my attention with its mythological flair throughout and its enthralling details. Her nonlinear narratives can be abstruse and echo multiple voices, but they’re highly imaginative in their cultural explorations and their touches of magical realism. She weaves tales that span only a page or more to fully engaging stories of traditional length at twenty to thirty pages, many of them truly unforgettable.
A handful stood out for me: “Eleven” is a very short yet memorable philosophical coming-of-age tale. “One Holy Night” relays a somewhat frightening romantic thriller between a young girl and a seductive older man who is not who he claims to be. “Never Marry a Mexican” offers both seriousness and humor in its examination of culture and marriage. “Eyes of Zapata” lends intense scrutiny to the challenges of love and commitment through a fictionalization of the women in the life of legendary Mexican revolutionary Emiliano Zapata. “Bien Pretty” continues with exploring the rigors, disappointments, and betrayals of relationships.
I’ve long admired Cisneros’s poetry, but I found her most famous book, the novella of interconnected micro stories The House on Mango Street, to lack depth and development. However, with Woman Hollering Creek she demonstrates how talented and imaginative she can be as a prose stylist and storyteller. I will be revisiting some of these stories to admire their fine craftsmanship and the remarkable quality of her descriptions of characters and places....more
Jackson has a talent for delivering horror in such a subtle and nonchalant manner that the shock and disgust of what’s happening is almost comical. ThJackson has a talent for delivering horror in such a subtle and nonchalant manner that the shock and disgust of what’s happening is almost comical. The same is true with the way she confronts the casualness of racism in the book’s most complete story “Flower Garden” where she charts how Jim Crow bigotry is so ingrained and hidden in those who wield its power that they seem unaware, or maybe not, of how their repulsive actions exploit and degrade those who are victims of racism. A wariness unsettles you in these stories as the dread plays out and leaves you shaking your head at the absurdity and sadness of human cruelty. Some of the stories, however, did have a truncated quality to them as though they could have been more thoroughly polished and developed....more
Ellis’s fame rests primarily upon American Psycho, a stunning and ingenious novel that blurs reality and hallucination while chronicling the obsessionEllis’s fame rests primarily upon American Psycho, a stunning and ingenious novel that blurs reality and hallucination while chronicling the obsessions of vanity and materialism like few works of fiction can do. However, his masterpiece is Glamorama, a mindblowing epic satire that exposes the decadence of celebrity in American culture.
The narrator Victor Ward has gained entry into the world of stardom as a top male model. He dates one of the hottest women in the fashion industry, yet he’s cheating on her with another knockout sensation. While he’s helping to open the trendiest nightclub in Manhattan in the 1990s, his obsession with his rising celebrity causes his life to spiral, due in part to his dependence on Xanax, cocaine, and liquor.
The novel excels into a thriller when Victor takes up an assignment and heads off to London and Paris in search of a female model who has disappeared. He soon becomes embroiled with dangerous acquaintances and lustful affairs that pull him into a network of terrorist conspiracies where his mind straddles a flimsy boundary between reality and fantasy.
Menacing with paranoia, wild with suspense, twisted with dark and wry humor, graphic with male and female sexcapades, and brutal with spectacles of violence, Glamorama moves from exhilarating and hilarious to sorrowful and terrifying in the blink of an eye. It is unlike anything you can ever imagine reading. It is unforgettable in the clever, intelligent, and astonishing ways that can make a book great.
Glamorama transfixed me and left me baffled while also making me laugh at its absurdity. Nothing quite compares to the relentless force of antipathy Ellis aims at dismantling the façade of celebrity. It is a novel that may exhaust you with its unceasing depravity, yet it has touching moments, and you’re left craving more of its thrilling amalgam of amusement and mayhem....more
A chance encounter between characters Black and White, two middle-aged men, on the platform of a New York City subway leads to a profound discussion bA chance encounter between characters Black and White, two middle-aged men, on the platform of a New York City subway leads to a profound discussion back at Black’s apartment. White, a professor, has forsaken God and given up any belief that life could possibly have meaning for him or the human race. Having saved White from jumping in front of a train, Black, an ex-con, relies on faith for guidance and tries to convince White to reconsider his place in the world.
The Sunset Limited is labeled as “a novel in dramatic form,” but it functions more like a monologue shared by two intelligent individuals dancing and colliding with their banter, each delivering one inquiry into another about what constitutes the purpose of life. Is humankind finite? Does consciousness survive death? What is pain? Is happiness possible? How should one choose to live? Do we owe an obligation to our fellow citizens to do right and bring good into the world?
Mostly, their conversation is a solemn tug-of-war of intellectualism interspersed with stories of human brutality and flashes of McCarthy’s dark humor, which is too often overlooked and underappreciated. Even though the “novel” is composed entirely of dialogue, that doesn’t mean it lacks those stunning McCarthy passages in which he pontificates on matters unknowable, such as an explanation of our existence. Below are a few McCarthy lightning strikes of prose, written stripped of conventional punctation and riveting in the originality of their sentence structuring.
Black: “I think whatever truth is wrote in these pages [of the Bible] is wrote in the human heart too and it was wrote there a long time ago and will still be wrote there a long time hence. Even if this book is burned ever copy of it. What Jesus said? I dont think he made up a word of it. I think he just told it. This book is a guide for the ignorant and the sick at heart. A whole man wouldnt need it at all. And of course if you read this book you goin to find that they’s a lot more talk in here about the wrong way than they is about the right way. Now why is that?”
White: “The darker picture is always the correct one. When you read the history of the world you are reading a saga of bloodshed and greed and folly the import of which is impossible to ignore. And yet we imagine that the future will somehow be different. I’ve no idea why we are even still here but in all probability we will not be here much longer.”
Black: “Sometimes faith might just be a case of not havin nothin else left.”
The Sunset Limited can be read in a few hours, but it may stay with you forever. ...more
McCarthy offers a compelling glimpse into four generations of a Black family from Louisville in the early 1970s. Their reliance on the trade of stonemMcCarthy offers a compelling glimpse into four generations of a Black family from Louisville in the early 1970s. Their reliance on the trade of stonemasonry plays a vital aspect in the family’s connectiveness and dissolution. Ben Telfair and his beloved grandfather Papaw, who is over a hundred years old, share an indelible bond committed to the skill and nostalgia needed to be masterful stonemasons. Sorrow, guilt, and regret haunt the Telfairs and challenge their principles of dignity and loyalty. With the solemnity and immediacy of his words, McCarthy examines the forces that can steer one person wayward into hardship and betrayal and another towards a purpose guided by hardwork, grace, and the love of another. A number of monologues delivered by Ben overflow with sage truth that deserve annotation. Here’s a classic passage as only McCarthy could compose it, stripped of apostrophes and brilliant in its structural originality: “I dont know what it means that things exist and then exist no more. Trees. Dogs. People. Will that namelessness into which we vanish then taste of us? The world was before man was and it will be again when he is gone. But it was not this world nor will it be, for where man lives is in this world only.”...more
Cisneros compiles dozens of micro stories that are vaguely interconnected in their association with characters living on or around the neighborhood ofCisneros compiles dozens of micro stories that are vaguely interconnected in their association with characters living on or around the neighborhood of Mango Street in Chicago, circa the mid to late 1960s. The main character among dozens is Esperanza Cordero, a headstrong and determined Latina adolescent nearing her teens who has dreams of leaving behind the confines and hardships of Mango Street and having her own home someday where she can pursue her desire to write.
The longest of the stories spans about five pages with most of them only a page or two, and each story is constructed in the most spare, laconic prose, stripped of quotation marks and strict rules of sentence structure. I like the poetic style of the writing, but as a loosely affiliated set of stories wanting to function as a novel, The House on Mango Street lacks depth and development. Accolades are hyperbole that state the characters leap from the page with realness. Moments emerge throughout the stories that produce tender and heartfelt sadness and at other times wry humor, yet not enough sustained drama and connection among the characters leaves the narrative too simplified.
The novel can be consumed in a few hours, and I appreciate its message of following dreams and powering through adversity that can often crush one’s spirit to be what you want to be, but nothing stands out as overly memorable in this book. Cisneros published The House on Mango Street when she was thirty, and it feels like she was feeling her towards her voice and creativity as a great writer. Last year I immersed in her most recent book, an outstanding collection of poetry titled Woman Without Shame, and now having finally read what’s hailed as classic in The House on Mango Street, I admire Cisneros more as a talented poet....more
Isaac Asimov’s brilliance is undeniable, and his creative mind to produce endless tales of science fiction led to a prolific amount of work throughoutIsaac Asimov’s brilliance is undeniable, and his creative mind to produce endless tales of science fiction led to a prolific amount of work throughout his career. In trying his short stories, my expectations were high, but they did not engage me as much as I would have liked. The range of his ideas is quite remarkable, but Asimov’s style made many of the stories tedious. Most of them rely almost exclusively on lengthy dialogue sequences with two or more characters hashing out the realms and intricacies of scientific theories like they’re taking turns composing an essay. More development of the characters and the settings would have increased my interest, as would tighter editing. Asimov wrote over 400 books, so that might account for lack of editing and what felt like verbose, unpolished prose and/or dialogue, even in some of the shortest pieces. With my venture into trying out science fiction from one of the declared masters of the craft, I assess Asimov as an ingenious mind, but not a great writer....more
It is no hyperbole to declare each of the eight stories in Ben Fountain’s collection as extraordinary. Often examining how ruthless politics and unendIt is no hyperbole to declare each of the eight stories in Ben Fountain’s collection as extraordinary. Often examining how ruthless politics and unending civil violence in locales from Colombia to Haiti to Sierra Leone cause horrific injustice and suffering, Fountain has a knack for constructing narratives that deliver tremendous compassion surged throughout with tinges of dark humor. His stories can mesmerize with adventure and suspense, mystery and absurdity, often both heartfelt and heartbreaking. He crafts beautiful, propulsive prose, each sentence functioning with depth and insight like a poem. He captures landscapes and cityscapes with enthralling details, and he traps his characters in moral quandaries that keep your heart pounding. Brief Encounters with Che Guevara commands attention with its tenacity to dazzle the senses while also forcing you into necessary reflection about the the hardships faced by so many around the world....more
The Ghost Writer: Nathan Zuckerman is at twenty-three a talented, ambitious writer who has recently gained praise from critics for his first publisThe Ghost Writer: Nathan Zuckerman is at twenty-three a talented, ambitious writer who has recently gained praise from critics for his first published stories. With anxiousness and expectation, he reaches out to his literary hero, the renowned E.I. Lonoff. When Lonoff invites Nathan to visit him at his secluded farmhouse outside of Boston, Nathan heads off in the middle of a snowy winter to meet his hero.
Nathan encounters Lonoff as a generous and humble host with an obsessive regimen to his work. He also gains sight of a beautiful young woman, a former student of Lonoff’s, who is staying with Lonoff and his wife of thirty-five years. Unclear to Nathan is this lovely young woman’s function in the household, a mystery that contributes to his instant infatuation with her. Who she could be stimuluses his imagination to construct a fantastical narrative about her from the vague details Lonoff provides during their conversations.
Over the course of dinner and during the night as Nathan stays over as a guest, he hears and observes more details that help embellish his tale to offer a stunning revelation about this beguiling woman. Just like she is entrancing, The Ghost Writer delivers a captivating tale of a relationship between an older and younger writer, and how their experiences play out in their work.
Roth is masterful with how he blurs the boundaries between artistic vision and reality, and with how he addresses questions of what responsibility the writer has to his work and others. As he constructs a story within a story about the purpose of literature, Roth delivers an enthralling drama about identity and passion that charges forward like a thriller. As is trademark with his brilliant work, his stories rage with ideas and philosophy woven seamlessly into compelling narratives.
Zuckerman Unbound: No one quite matches Philip Roth’s genius at dark comedy, and Zuckerman Unbound, the second installment featuring Roth’s iconic alter-ego character Nathan Zuckerman, may be his most satirical and outlandish work. Roth’s central aim, beyond his brilliance at grave humor, is steering his narrative towards an examination of the unavoidable sorrow at the heart of human frailty and impermanence.
In holding back nothing as he addresses the follies and consequences of both controllable and uncontrollable forces, Roth likes to blur the lines between what is known about his real life and what he portrays in his fiction. His efforts give us a more truthful, authentic, and robust set of mirrors to reflect on the impact society has on us in relation to our own decisions.
Zuckerman similar to Roth is a writer at the height of his fame, and so he cannot escape the absurdity of tabloids and the press, in addition to interactions with those who either love or hate him. Much like we know of Roth, Zuckerman too struggles with relationships and marriages that drive him batty. Zuckerman also relishes and resents the puzzlement others make of him, causing his motives to be misunderstood as a writer.
Typical of Roth’s artistic vision, everything he depicts through Zuckerman veers on tragedy and human weakness and our oftentimes inadequacy to cope, yet everything Zuckerman deals with is often hilarious while at the same time unsettling. What makes Roth so mesmerizing is the way he delivers narratives so imbued with a blend of comic truth and crushing sadness so that you laugh one minute while feeling your heart breaking the next.
The ending of Zuckerman Unbound is particularly solemn and moving and offers Roth at his signature best. He is remarkable at taking us on these intense, bizarre, dizzying, and of course raucous rides before slowly pulling us towards a dramatic climax that is devastating as much as affecting.
The Anatomy Lesson: At forty, the famous writer Nathan Zuckerman (Roth’s iconic alter-ego character) has come down with a bizarre affliction of excruciating pain that channels from his neck down across his shoulders and into his arms. The ailment, of course, drives Zuckerman to utter madness because he cannot focus and write and also because from one doctor to another none can diagnose the cause, source, or reason for the debilitating pain.
Having endured through what he feels is misguided attacks on his satirical novel Carnovsky about Jewish heritage, Zuckerman feels lost with his commitment to his fiction, more so with the pain derailing him from his writing routine. In a desperate and valiant attempt to confront the inexplicable pain that is ruining his life, Zuckerman fantasizes about going back to school to be a medical doctor. So he heads off to his alma mater in Chicago with the hope of overcoming the dilemma of his hardships.
The Anatomy Lesson is a wild escapade of a novel strewn throughout with Roth’s genius use of wry, dark humor and his trademark of having no inhibitions with exploring carnality and desire. It’s also one of his most erudite and philosophical narratives as he tackles the anguish of mental and physical pain, brought on both by Zuckerman’s own madness of excessive bitterness towards those with criticism of his books and by his abuse of prescription drugs and alcohol.
Even when Roth’s ecstatic prose becomes so intense with hypnotic details and lyrical insight, he knows how to steer his narratives towards unforgettable endings. The Anatomy Lesson offers a profoundly humbling and humane conclusion to this fierce and comedic installment within the Zuckerman series. Roth showcases his brilliance in addressing the most challenging questions of what life amounts to when faced with the madness of suffering.
The Prague Orgy: One of Roth’s shorter works, The Prague Orgy lacks nothing in the impact it delivers and the reflection it demands. Roth’s genius toys with us the way he assembles stories within stories blurring one fiction within another to the point where reality is made clearer, and simultaneously more elusive and dangerous, through his superb use of irony and how he opposes forces: nobility against perversity, good against evil.
After encountering a repressed Czech writer named Sisovsky seeking refuge in New York, renowned American author Nathan Zuckerman travels to Prague on a mission to attain the unpublished Yiddish manuscript penned by Sisovsky’s father. As he traverses the highly policed city of Prague, Zuckerman becomes entangled in the despondent lives of Olga, Sisovsky’s estranged wife, and others among Prague’s literary underground. Whose story is true and what truth lies in the power of literature to counteract the shortcomings of reality?
Olga’s sad and comical lust with wanting to marry Zuckerman to escape the oppressiveness of the communist state contrasts with the sad and grave tactics of the state watching Zuckerman’s every move, whether he realizes it or not, to retrieve the manuscript and take it with him back to America. Employing his signature blend of hilarity and bawdiness, Roth is every bit as playful as he is serious about the power of art, particularly the written word, which totalitarian states will do anything to suppress.
The Prague Orgy begins with a simple adventure, but it bolts forward into a suspenseful drama that registers with scathing indictment against restrictive governments and authoritative regimes doing everything in their power to bury writers and their works. Roth reminds us of the power of art because if books weren’t powerful, those trying to silence the written word wouldn’t be using so much of their power to keep writers quiet. ...more
Atwood’s acclaimed novel The Blind Assassin, winner of the 2000 Booker Prize, starts off in gripping fashion and concludes with plenty more fascinatinAtwood’s acclaimed novel The Blind Assassin, winner of the 2000 Booker Prize, starts off in gripping fashion and concludes with plenty more fascinating twists and revelations. It is, however, somewhat laborious throughout its long middle section, which becomes a tremendously detailed account of the lives of Laura and Iris Chase, Canadian sisters who were born into wealth and who come of age and face traumatic personal adversity during the World War II years.
Atwood’s ambitious narrative also combines a story within a story of a sci-fi novel (with the same name as the novel’s actual title) in which Laura apparently penned before she drove off a bridge, committing suicide. But why? The slow revealing of clues is bearable due entirely to Atwood’s exquisite prose and her studious attention to exhilarating details. However, Laura’s novel (or is it really hers?) lends for less interesting chapters.
My interest in The Blind Assassin came about with wanting to see how Atwood handled toggling multiple stories and how she wove them together. She most certainly delivers on the revelations of what plays out with the mystery involving the sisters, but she could have accomplished her feat with a speedier pace and a less circuitous path to arrive at her point of unveiling the truth....more
In the final installment employing his iconic alter-ego character Nathan Zuckerman, Philip Roth’s Exit Ghost concludes an astonishing nine-book seriesIn the final installment employing his iconic alter-ego character Nathan Zuckerman, Philip Roth’s Exit Ghost concludes an astonishing nine-book series where Roth demonstrates once again how he lost nothing late in his career with delivering a thrilling literary drama with his trademark ability to blur the reality of what is happening in his narrative by offering alternate scenarios to what may be the truth.
For the past eleven years, the renowned writer Zuckerman has removed himself from society and secluded in a cabin in the Berkshires to conduct his peerless discipline of writing his novels. After surviving prostate cancer years earlier, which has left him physically challenged and depleted of desire, the solitary life in the woods has been his comfort and relief.
When a new medical procedure to counteract his bodily deficiencies presents itself, Zuckerman heads back to Manhattan for treatment. While in the city, old passions and enthusiasms that he thought he wanted nothing to do with begin to tantalize him into reconsidering his decisions of having left more than a decade ago. A chance encounter at the hospital with Amy Bollette, now suffering from a brain tumor, has Zuckerman wondering about his own past experiences and choices.
Bollette was the young mistress of Zuckerman’s literary hero E.I. Lonoff. Zuckerman had met the great writer and his lover over fifty years earlier during an invitation to visit Lonoff’s own secluded residence in the Berkshires, an experience he forever cherished and recounted in unforgettable fashion in one of Roth’s most mesmerizing novels The Ghost Writer.
Thinking he may need the energy of everyday interactions offered by the big city, Zuckerman seeks a swap of his cabin for the posh apartment of a young couple, both aspiring writers, wanting to escape the fears of a post-9/11 New York. Zuckerman also finds himself harassed for recollections about Bollette by an ambitious and ruthless young biographer who wants to scandalize Lonoff.
The clever interplay between Zuckerman and those he encounters in the city is both riveting and enthralling as Roth moves back and forth in time through the memories of the characters and Zuckerman’s own fantasies and desires, all of which throw truth and reality into chaos. Moreover, Roth flexes his strength, affirming he’s still at his best with the way he examines the impact of sorrow, animosity, and fear, particularly in regard to aging and death.
A most remarkable aspect of Exit Ghost is how Roth demonstrates his foresight and knowledge of the slide America had begun into fascism. The novel was published in 2007, but it recounts events taking place in 2004 amid the disaster of America reelecting George W. Bush. Roth is nothing short of predictive in how he identifies the dangerous intent of the GOP’s relentless utilization of grievance, religion, and militarism, which took full consequence under Trump, to carry out policies fueled by cruelty, intolerance, and exclusion under the guise of safety and family values....more