October 24, 2009
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon Well, Casey touched on a lot of things we agreed on in this book.  First of all, it is a Pulitzer winner, so right there you know it will be quality.  Like Casey, it took me about the same time to become wrapped up in this book, but once Chabon got his hooks in it was all over for me.  Yes he can be a bit wordy.  He isn’t afraid to make us open a dictionary, but I never felt like he was doing it to merely flex his intellectual muscle and wield it over us Average Joe’s.  Especially now, looking back at it, he seemed to make me slow down and pay closer attention to what he was building up to. As for the story itself, if I had to choose one word that encompassed my opinion of this book, that word would be depth.  Chabon develops characters that you really care about and feel terrible leaving at the end.  He doesn’t merely tell us about late ’30s New York, he gives it to us to experience for ourselves.  Chabon layers meaning upon meaning throughout the novel - enough to keep us busy for days thinking about what he may have meant by one sentence, or why he put that certain word in there.  He didn’t fall into easy stereotypes and villains were hard to come by.  Franz Kafka, who was also Jewish and from Prague like Joe Kavalier, said “Hiding places there are innumerable, escape is only one, but possibilities of escape, again, are as many as hiding places.” This says a lot about what both Kavalier and Clay struggle with in this book.  They are both hiding in their own ways, but do they ever really escape their bonds?  Will they ever be able to truly escape or have they run out of chances? I can’t tell you enough to read this book and give it another try if you’ve put it down before.  There is nothing cheap in it.  Chabon has made sure of that.  It should be taught in schools everywhere.  Please read it. Jon. AV Club Review  Excerpt from Bold Type

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon

Well, Casey touched on a lot of things we agreed on in this book.  First of all, it is a Pulitzer winner, so right there you know it will be quality.  Like Casey, it took me about the same time to become wrapped up in this book, but once Chabon got his hooks in it was all over for me.  Yes he can be a bit wordy.  He isn’t afraid to make us open a dictionary, but I never felt like he was doing it to merely flex his intellectual muscle and wield it over us Average Joe’s.  Especially now, looking back at it, he seemed to make me slow down and pay closer attention to what he was building up to.

As for the story itself, if I had to choose one word that encompassed my opinion of this book, that word would be depth.  Chabon develops characters that you really care about and feel terrible leaving at the end.  He doesn’t merely tell us about late ’30s New York, he gives it to us to experience for ourselves.  Chabon layers meaning upon meaning throughout the novel - enough to keep us busy for days thinking about what he may have meant by one sentence, or why he put that certain word in there.  He didn’t fall into easy stereotypes and villains were hard to come by. 

Franz Kafka, who was also Jewish and from Prague like Joe Kavalier, said

“Hiding places there are innumerable, escape is only one, but possibilities of escape, again, are as many as hiding places.”

This says a lot about what both Kavalier and Clay struggle with in this book.  They are both hiding in their own ways, but do they ever really escape their bonds?  Will they ever be able to truly escape or have they run out of chances?

I can’t tell you enough to read this book and give it another try if you’ve put it down before.  There is nothing cheap in it.  Chabon has made sure of that.  It should be taught in schools everywhere.  Please read it.

Jon.

AV Club Review 

Excerpt from Bold Type