Sammy Clay is a young Jewish man in Brooklyn, living with
his mother and grandmother and working for a novelty company. He loves
America’s latest invention, comic books, and dreams of being an author or comic
book writer someday. From the other side of the world, Sammy’s cousin Joe
travels from Prague all the way to Brooklyn; his family used every resource
they had to get him out ahead of the Nazis, in a covert escape to rival those
of Houdini, whom both Joe and Sammy admire.
The two cousins meet when Joe arrives in the middle of the
night and are soon fast friends. Within days, Sammy’s dreams suddenly seem to
be within reach, when he sees what an amazing artist his newfound cousin is.
Together, the two of them create a their own superhero, The Escapist, in the
new tradition of the already-popular Superman, and convince Sammy’s boss and
some colleagues to take a chance with them. Their success tracks along in time
with Hitler’s rise and leads them into a lifetime of adventure, love, and
sometimes painful sorrow.
I said this was an epic novel, and it is in several
different ways. It follows the young men’s friendship for 20 years, with
flashbacks to their childhoods, as it follows world events from the late 1930’s
and Hitler’s rise to the post-war world of the1950’s. The readers go along for
the ride as Sammy and Joe’s characters rise to fame along with their
creators. There are plenty of surprises along the way for both young men and
for readers.
Chabon is a talented writer, weaving a tale that is part
historical fiction and part literary fiction, telling the story of the boys’
friendship as well as the story of comic books themselves. At over 650 pages,
this is a hefty novel, and Chabon tends to be a verbose writer, sometimes
including lengthy descriptions, as well as employing long sentences and
paragraphs. Normally, this would bother me, but in this case, I was pulled in
by both the engaging story and characters and his way of sometimes saying
something so perfectly that I felt compelled to re-read it and even write it
down, like this sentence:
“In the immemorial style of young men under pressure, they decided to lie down for a while and waste time.”
As the mother of two young men, I can attest to the truth of
this statement!
Interestingly, of the six people who came to our book group
discussion for this book, three of us loved the book, and the other three
strongly disliked it. Of those three who did not enjoy it, two were elderly
women, one didn’t finish it, and all three said they had no interest in comic
books. What surprised me was how much I DID like it, since I also had no
interest in comic books (probably part of the reason why I didn’t read the
novel earlier). I experienced it more as a book about friendship, love, and
life, with a backdrop of history and comic books. All in all, I am glad to have
finally read this remarkable novel, and I still find myself thinking about the
characters a month after finishing the book – for me, that is always a sign of
a good book.
656 pages, Random House
This looks great! I never would have looked twice at this book without your review. Thanks!
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing with #smallvictoriessunday. l have heard of this book but didn't know it was 650 pages, was part historical fiction, part literary fiction, or dealt with comic books! Sounds interesting.
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