Polina Kozlova Kozlova itibaren Subhanpur, Uttar Pradesh 206252, Hindistan
There are 5-star books and then there are astonishing books that contain all the stars in the sky. Galactic. I cannot write this review sans hyperbole. Why? Because the meaning(s) of this novel expands: the more you meditate on it, the more boundless in its connections and scope. However, the fundamental theme is illuminated by the author through the character of Gloria on pp 306 of the ARC: "...everything in New York is built upon another thing, nothing is entirely by itself, each thing as strange as the last, and connected." Although New York City 1974 is McCann's vital, breathing subject, you can love this story without ever having visited the city. You have surely lodged with the savage nobility of the human spirit--the exquisite pain and extraordinary beauty of the soul; degenerate misery; wild exultation; unutterable grief; merciful exaltation; boneless survival. All this manifests and more as a crescendo of disparate voices intersect, climb and caterwaul to a swirling catharsis. Above, at 110 stories, in artful equipoise, funambulist Philippe Petit performs on a high wire between the North and South Twin Towers, captivating a swell of onlookers on the ground below. With his ballet shoes and 55-lb. balancing pole, he leaps, dances, lays down, salutes, converses with a circling gull, and makes eight crossings between the two towers. Strange, dangerous, impossible, realized. The book favors theme and character development over plot, and yet the pages turn with as much tension as a gripping thriller. It is a high-wire act both literally and metaphorically. McCann's mega-watt prose is ripe with paradox and parabola, like this story. The highborn; hopeless; corrupt; wretched; and the darlings intersect and reveal a common core. There is momentum, then a staggering halt--and, in the end, the great world spins. A+
Elegantly written with perfect pacing and an economy of words, Márai weaves a tale of fate postponed, but never denied. As if caught in a slowly moving but remorsefulness whirlpool, you feel yourself pulled in a direction that is neither good nor satisfying, but just must be. We are of a time and place where protagonists can claw, kick, scream, and scheme their way out of any situation. Predestination is for the medievalists! This is not that time and place and anything as unseemly as kicking and screaming would never find its place in a Sándor Márai book. Instead, as in Embers, the story unfolds with deliberation and we and the characters are as powerless to do anything as the fly in the web. Acceptance is the sum of our destiny.
A quick read that cuts through conservative republican rhetoric without being rhetorical itself.
It is in the 1970's. The city is divided by a highway, blacks on one side, and whites on the other. Frannie is black. One day, a white kid arrives in her classroom. He is supposed to be on the other highway...weird. There's a rumor spreading that he might be Jesus, so people call him the Jesus Kid, J.K. for short. Read this book to discover the truth about this kid, and how Frannie came to find it.