A beautiful novel whose only fault is ending too soon.
A novel about sexuality, acceptance, and Middle Eastern culture.
National Jewish Book Award winner Fallenberg’s (When We Dance on Water, 2011, etc.) most recent novel starts when an unnamed narrator decides to write a letter to Adam, his old college friend, who's sitting across the room from him. Months before, the narrator arrived at Adam’s doorstep in a "middling city of America," providing no explanation as to why, how, or for how long. Launching into a 100-plus-page letter, the narrator explains the events that led up to his arrival. The narrator was visiting Tel Aviv with his friends when he met Uzi, a spice merchant whose smell was “meaty, truly pungent and ripe.” Compelled by the pheromones Uzi was releasing, the narrator decides to leave his friends and stay with Uzi. Immediately, the two engage in an animalistic, uncontrollably sexual relationship: “We were a mess, a heaving, sweating, panting, quivering mess.” Uzi, the typically macho laborer, welcomes the narrator into his home, to the surprise of his family, namely his ex-wife, who lives across the property. But homosexuality, however stigmatized it may be in Israel, doesn’t seem to be that important to Uzi’s family—their main concern is why now. Uzi and the narrator lead a typical life from then on, with the narrator spearheading the expansion of Uzi’s spice business. Everything is going well until Ibrahim, the son of Uzi’s friend, arrives for an apprenticeship. Filled with jealousy and resentment, the narrator progressively loses his mind. Fallenberg’s story is one of heartbreak in which guilt and feelings of inadequacy ultimately cause his characters’ downfalls. Written entirely in the form of a letter to Adam, the story is magnetic, drawing readers in from the first crotch-grab to the last goodbye. But more important, this is a complicated study of the ways in which religious heritage—from codes of honor to familial expectations—interacts with business and acceptance, family and lovers, and self-realization.
A beautiful novel whose only fault is ending too soon.Pub Date: Sept. 4, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-59051-943-1
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Other Press
Review Posted Online: July 16, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An illuminating read for anyone interested in the inner workings of the Catholic Church; for prelate-fiction superfans, it...
Harris, creator of grand, symphonic thrillers from Fatherland (1992) to An Officer and a Spy (2014), scores with a chamber piece of a novel set in the Vatican in the days after a fictional pope dies.
Fictional, yes, but the nameless pontiff has a lot in common with our own Francis: he’s famously humble, shunning the lavish Apostolic Palace for a small apartment, and he is committed to leading a church that engages with the world and its problems. In the aftermath of his sudden death, rumors circulate about the pope’s intention to fire certain cardinals. At the center of the action is Cardinal Lomeli, Dean of the College of Cardinals, whose job it is to manage the conclave that will elect a new pope. He believes it is also his duty to uncover what the pope knew before he died because some of the cardinals in question are in the running to succeed him. “In the running” is an apt phrase because, as described by Harris, the papal conclave is the ultimate political backroom—albeit a room, the Sistine Chapel, covered with Michelangelo frescoes. Vying for the papal crown are an African cardinal whom many want to see as the first black pope, a press-savvy Canadian, an Italian arch-conservative (think Cardinal Scalia), and an Italian liberal who wants to continue the late pope’s campaign to modernize the church. The novel glories in the ancient rituals that constitute the election process while still grounding that process in the real world: the Sistine Chapel is fitted with jamming devices to thwart electronic eavesdropping, and the pressure to act quickly is increased because “rumours that the pope is dead are already trending on social media.”
An illuminating read for anyone interested in the inner workings of the Catholic Church; for prelate-fiction superfans, it is pure temptation.Pub Date: Nov. 22, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-451-49344-6
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 6, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2016
These letters from some important executive Down Below, to one of the junior devils here on earth, whose job is to corrupt mortals, are witty and written in a breezy style seldom found in religious literature. The author quotes Luther, who said: "The best way to drive out the devil, if he will not yield to texts of Scripture, is to jeer and flout him, for he cannot bear scorn." This the author does most successfully, for by presenting some of our modern and not-so-modern beliefs as emanating from the devil's headquarters, he succeeds in making his reader feel like an ass for ever having believed in such ideas. This kind of presentation gives the author a tremendous advantage over the reader, however, for the more timid reader may feel a sense of guilt after putting down this book. It is a clever book, and for the clever reader, rather than the too-earnest soul.
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1942
ISBN: 0060652934
Page Count: 53
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 17, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1943
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