The Great Believers

If you believe that forgiveness is the ultimate act of love then Rebecca Makkai's remarkable new book, "The Great Believers," will feel deeply satisfying. This gorgeous novel takes readers back to the height of the AIDS epidemic in the '80's when paranoia was rampant and the so-called gay scourge tore families apart. It may be difficult for younger people to even remember what a horrible time that was. Some of us who are older probably read "And the Band Played On" by Randy Shilts and thought we knew everything there was to know. Makkai makes it personal.

The story begins in 1985 Chicago at a memorial service, the first of oh so many that will be held in the coming years, for Nico, a gay man who was the beating heart of his large group of friends, the first to fall ill. The only woman in attendance is Nico's beloved sister Fiona whose fate will be to bear witness to the suffering and death of too many young men.

Makkai fills her book with great characters, infuriating, caring, selfish, and ambitious, but the man we come to know intimately is Yale Tishman, naïve and trusting, yearning for a long-term relationship that includes a home with a picket fence, a pet, meals together at night in front of the TV. Instead, he has Charlie, a vain, life of the party, newspaper editor who preaches safe sex but doesn't practice it.

We toggle back and forth between late '80's Chicago as Yale pursues his career in art acquisition - a fascinating story in itself - and 2015 Paris. Fiona is the bridge. Fiona, a woman suffering from the trauma of losing everyone she's known and cared for. Is it possible that she's used up all the love she had to give? Unable to sustain her marriage, now estranged from her adult daughter, Fiona is on a mission to bridge the divide with her child and maybe even find a reservoir of compassion left for herself.

Throughout this poignant, heart breaking novel, Makkai reminds us of the history of the Act Up movement, the politics of the Reagan era, the slow move toward AIDS research before Hollywood got involved, and the fleeting hopes engendered when rumors surfaced of new drugs coming on the market. We witness the cruel reactions to the gay community of people who don't understand how the AIDS virus is spread, and we meet the unsung heroes, the nurses at the Cook County hospital, who cared so compassionately for these men in their final days.

Yes, the world has advanced considerably for the rights of the LGBTQ community over the past four decades but we cannot forget, Makkai reminds us. As with so many other civil rights issues we must remain constantly vigilant lest the ugly past resurface. "The Great Believers" is now number two on my 2018 favorites list.

 

A Second National Book Award for Jesmyn Ward?

Jesmyn Ward is already on the long list for the National Book Award though her latest novel, after NBA winner "Salvage the Bones," has only been out for a few weeks. This is a remarkable testament to the consistent quality of Jesmyn Ward's skills, the way her narrative voice evokes all the joy, heartbreak, and anguish of a certain southern time and place and people. In thirteen-year-old JoJo, Ward has given birth to a character so anxious and watchful yet so loving and selfless that you want to wrap him up in your arms and take him home with you.

JoJo and his baby sister Kayla are the mixed race children of Michael, serving a three year stint at Parchman Farm, part of the infamous Mississippi state prison system, and Leonie, an addict who is so involved in her own needs that those of her children go unheeded. But for Leonie's parents, with whom they live, JoJo and Kayla would likely have been caught up in the foster care system a long time ago. But Pop and Mama, steadfast grandparents who lead by example, are working through their own crisis. Mama is at the end of a long struggle with cancer, Pop is trying to be all things to all people, and Leonie is off on binges for days or weeks at a time.

Not a single word is misplaced in this tight little novel that toggles back and forth between Leonie's and JoJo's points of view, between the present and years ago when Pop was also at Parchman. There he befriended a child named Richie who, like oh so many black boys in minor trouble, were housed and used in the cotton fields as slave laborers. Richie appears as an unquiet spirit, still wandering the land in search of the answers to his death appearing to JoJo who, like his mother, has a sixth sense. Please don't be put off by the use of ghosts to speak of past atrocities. The trope works. The unburied sing.

In exquisitely wrought prose, Ward sanctifies the relationship between JoJo and Kayla. She is everything to him. She is his reason for living, the vessel for his love, and Leonie can't stand it. She is unreasonably, but not inexplicably, filled with rage over the state of her life. When Kayla screams for JoJo and only JoJo to satisfy her needs, Leonie is both relieved and infuriated. She intuits but doesn't admit that her children feel safer with each other than with her even though she yearns for some semblance of family with Michael and their kids.

Naturally race plays a central role here, Michael is white and his family refuses to accept his black wife and children. But more than the personal, it is the long view of the south and racial injustices that interest Ms. Ward. She fuses the stereotypical story of poor black families just trying to survive with the untold stories of the past that history would prefer to bury. Her ghosts speak eloquently of a time we persist in believing and hoping is behind us. Though we now know that it may never be behind us, Ward gives us a glimpse of hope in "Sing Unburied Sing" that she didn't offer in "Salvage the Bones." 

I predict that multiple awards will be forthcoming for this crushingly beautiful novel. Grab it now before the holds list grows too long.

The Women in the Castle

Author Jessica Shattuck has been getting plenty of great press for her latest novel "The Women in the Castle." Many reviewers have compared it to Kristin Hannah's "The Nightingale," likely because both novels explore the power of resistance during war time, specifically during and after World War II. It wasn't until I had finished this book that I discovered that Shattuck actually had a personal reason for writing. Her grandmother was a member of the Nazi party in Germany. http://nyti.ms/2mB7Vb6

While "The Nightingale" was a true tearjerker, the story of the women in the castle is much less emotional but more nuanced and thought-provoking. The castle is the home of Marianne and Albrecht von Lingenfels, wealthy, connected Germans who see the rise of Hitler as a threat to their country and the life they hold dear. In Albrecht's office in the castle, a group of concerned citizens hatch a plot to assassinate the Fuhrer. One of the members of that plan is Connie Flederman, Marianne's childhood friend and dear companion, who tasks her with taking care of his wife should anything happen to him.

We know from history that this attempt on Hilter (Valkyrie) did fail and that the men involved were condemned to death as traitors. Now, as she tries to sort through the aftermath of her husband's execution while raising her three children, Marianne, true to her word, uses her connections to track down the wives and children of the other perpetrators and bring them to the castle. As women on their own in a country now overrun with Russian prisoners of war and American troops, Marianne believes they will find some semblance of safety if they band together.

Through flashbacks we learn about the lives of the other two women. Benita, wife of Connie, is a naïve, small-town girl whose happy-go-lucky nature kept her from thinking deeply about politics and her husband's place in history. Separated from her beloved son Martin, Benita loses the will to live until Marianne rescues both her and Martin, installing them at the castle.

Ania is the single mother of two boys. Not much is known about the fate of her husband but she is tough and practical, joining forces with Marianne to cultivate the land around the castle, providing sustenance for their improvised family and matching Marianne's grit and determination with her own strong will.

How these women form an unbreakable bond is the ostensible storyline but the crux of the novel lies in their back stories. Each has secrets, each has been forced to make morally repugnant decisions. Why they did so and how they chose to live with their pasts and with themselves are the questions at the heart of Shattuck's book. One senses, after reading her own essay about her grandmother, that she is using fiction as a means of working through her own questions about right and wrong and the ambiguous nature of decisions made during wartime.

Spanning three generations and two continents, Shattuck's novel would be a good choice for book groups that aren't afraid of going deep. After all, it's not such a stretch to consider that resistance may once again be necessary to save our way of life. Who will have the courage to step up?

Nine Island by Jane Alison

I am on a never-ending quest for books set in Florida that I can read and review for The Florida Book Page, my monthly radio stint on our local NPR station WGCU. This can be more difficult than it sounds since I want to actually LIKE the book and consider it well written. What a pleasant surprise to open last Sunday's New York Times Book Review and find not one, but two new books that fit the description. I'll be waiting a while for John Grisham's "The Whistler," but "Nine Island," by Jane Alison, http://www.janealisonauthor.com/, a writer who is new to me, came in immediately. Now I plan to go back and read all her other books!

Advertised as a "non-fiction novel," a new one on me, this exquisite little gem of a book is melancholy yet hopeful, sad and funny and smart. Narrated by J, a woman at that precarious stage between youth and old age, who is wondering as the song goes, "should I stay or should I go?" From the floor to ceiling windows of her Miami high rise, she watches the toned bodies, the immoveable breasts, and the worked over faces of the women on the make and asks herself if it's worth it. Should she stay in the dating game or relinquish it for her literary pursuits.

J is a scholar of Ovid, as is the author. She is translating "The Metamorphoses," while pondering her own transition from the lush, sexual being she thinks she still is, to a woman who's given up on love. She reminisces about past affairs and a long, infertile marriage, and fantasizes about the toned young men who strut their stuff on the beaches and around the pools. When J is in the water she feels replenished, supple, lighter, more desirable, but ironically, the pool is in disrepair and about to be shut down indefinitely.

Living alone, J is curious about the comings and goings of some of her neighbors and they, in turn, are interested in her, especially N, the woman who beats J to the pool each morning and then disappears for the rest of the day in a whirl of mystery. N and her husband invite J for drinks. They want to know her better, whether she's contented with her life, with just Ovid and her old cat, or if she needs and expects more out of life.

This is not a novel for the impatient reader. This book reminds me of a good foreign film, contemplative and interior. It tantalizes and yes, it titillates. Alison has written a gorgeous meditation on life, on aging, on embracing what's offered and accepting that which we just may not be able to have.

Bright, Precious Days by Jay McInerney

Not all reviewers were equally smitten with Jay McInerney's third novel about Russell and Corrine Calloway. Reading between the lines, I gather that some may have found it too, well, precious. Not so for me. Because I haven't read the two previous works about this New York City power couple, "The Good Life," and "Darkness Falls," I came to them fresh, thanks to an advanced readers' copy from the publisher, Knopf. I really enjoyed this book. It's sarcastic, funny, poignant, biting, and honest.

Taking us inside the writing and publishing business right before the 2008 financial meltdown, McInerney drops so many literary names and references that some might accuse him of being pretentious. But I loved reading about the behind-the-scenes machinations that result in a published book. Especially well-done and realistic is Russell's discovery of a "fresh new voice in fiction." Jack is an unpolished kid from the south whose undisciplined work shone under Russell's editing, a young man whose success went to his head as quickly as his star faded.

McInerney says that New York is really just a small town where everyone knows everyone, and the city, from Soho to Harlem, is a major character in this book He conjures up the very essence of what it's like to live among, yet on the fringes of the 1%, the endless fund raisers, charity parties, openings, screenings, benefits. He pulls us into that life, shallow and exhausting, and mesmerizes us with the rich tapestry of lives lived on the edge of the precipice.

Yes, they made it through the sex, drugs, and rock and roll days, for which there's little nostalgia. Now, will they survive the indignities of middle age and the looming financial crisis? Obviously pulling on his own thoughts about aging, McInerney depicts couples in middle age, rethinking their marriages, contemplating (and often having) affairs, grasping at those last ditch efforts to stave off boredom even if it means downing a Cialis with your $1500 bottle of Bordeaux.

And yet, ever the generous writer, McInerney forgives Corinne and Russell, Washington and Veronica, Tom and Casey their vanities, their deceptions that mean so little in the overall scheme of things. There is much love and respect among these couples. They have histories that are worth preserving. There's a wonderful scene on the evening of the 2008 presidential election when the long time friends and their teenage kids sit together watching the news results roll in from the various TV stations, learning that Barack Obama will be the next president of the United States.

The champagne corks pop, the sense of hope in the future is palpable. We realize that these couples, these friends, will probably make it. I remembered my friend Don and I popping our own champagne that night here in Florida, calling my sister in Massachusetts, and I felt nostalgic for those bright, precious days. That's what a good writer can do for you.