Giving up, moving on...

How long do you give a book? Ten pages? Twenty? Fifty?

I used to be more patient, more forgiving of a book that didn’t engage me quickly. I respected authors who took their time unfolding a narrative. I felt that anyone who had written a novel deserved a long look.

Not so much these days. Partly, it’s my getting older—how many books, realistically, can I read in my remaining years? Partly, it’s a feeling that some writers, some good writers, are just phoning it in. That seems especially true of authors of series who may be pressured to crank out a book a year to satisfy fans or publisher. But I’ve noticed a trend—OK, maybe a trendlet—of well-known, well-regarded authors who’ve written pedestrian novels, work not worthy of them.

In recent months, I’ve plowed through two novels that I expected to love and admire—novels that I found disappointing on so many levels. One is a bloated (almost 500-pages) story tracing the lives of a group of friends through decades. I’d greatly admired the author’s previous novel and looked forward to this one, which was well reviewed. Ten pages in, I thought: “uh-oh.” But I kept going. And going. And going. At the end, the book felt as disappointing as it had felt on page 10. You could feel the machinery grinding, sense the author cranking it out.

Another book, by an even more celebrated author, was hailed as a major event, especially as it was his first novel in decades. I had a different experience with this one. The writing was breathtaking—the kind of prose that makes you stop, re-read a passage, maybe read it aloud, and wonder at the sheer beauty of it. No doubt about it: this is the real thing. But the story? So boring, so shallow. I wanted the main character to be more, to be greater than he was. I kept expecting that he would grow in integrity and wisdom. But no, just more women, more modest fame. At the end, I didn’t care. But I did feel angry with the author for pissing away his prodigious talent on such a slight story.

But maybe my anger is misplaced. Maybe it’s not fair to attack an author who, after all, has written something. Probably, my anger really is targeted at myself for insisting on continuing to read something that just doesn’t work for me. I feel that I’ve wasted my time, and clearly, it was my choice to waste my time. But I kept hoping things would get better—page after page.

How many pages do you give a book before you give up and move on?

Flying across the centuries

I’ve been yearning for a book like this.

For too many weeks, I’ve been reading books that were disappointing, banal, or even pretty good. But I’ve been craving a wonderful book—one that would pull me in, delight me with its style, engage me with its story.

Transatlantic is such a novel. It is superb on so many levels, it’s hard to know where to begin. Author Colm McCann, who won the 2009 National Book Award for his tour de force, Let the Great World Spin, has worked his magic again. He tells seven stories whose characters and themes interconnect, stitching connections between Ireland and America through a century and a half.

The first three accounts honor heroes whose imagination and persistence expand horizons. In 1919, Jack Alcock and Teddy Brown, British World War I veterans, kit out a Vickers Vimy (“a modified bomber, all wood and linen and wire”) and, against all odds, make the first transatlantic flight, from Newfoundland to the coast of Ireland. (Eight years later, Lindbergh would garner all the praise, because he made the first solo trans-Atlantic flight.) The social landscape of Ireland and the towering figure of abolitionist Frederick Douglass dominate the second tale. In 1845, Douglass made a lecture tour through Ireland and England, raising awareness about the scourge of slavery and raising funds for abolitionist groups in the United States. The final character to push back at boundaries is former U.S. Senator George Mitchell, who helped broker the peace between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland.

All three stories are anchored in history, but McCann’s magic is making the players real as well as heroic. The vivid details plunge us into the historic periods and also help us fully imagine the lives of these pioneering men.

As wonderful as their tales are, the stories in the second part of the book are even more powerful. Four generations of women—Irish and American—intersect with the men depicted in the book’s first section, mostly in small, seemingly insignificant ways. Yet, it is through the lens of these women—Lily, Emily, Lotte, Hannah—that we see clearly the cross-cutting paths of history, both large and personal. There are the usual milestones of life: marriage, children,  hardship, sorrow, death. Throughout it all, the women persevere and demonstrate their own kind of quiet heroism.

And the ending of this book is one of the most beautiful moments of grace I have ever encountered. It is a perfect Mobius strip for the entire sweep of the novel.

McCann’s style sometimes stops you in your tracks—and sometimes just sweeps you along in the power of story. So, yes, this book has been a joy to read. I want to start it over again.

Crazy about Anne

I just can’t be objective about Anne Tyler: I love her writing!

(Yes, yes, I know: use exclamation points sparingly. But there are exceptions. This is one.)

Initially, I was put off by the plot description of The Beginner’s Goodbye I read in reviews. I just wasn’t interested in one more book about a widow’s or widower’s grief. And the suggestion of a late spouse’s appearance, as a spirit with things to say, put me off.

But still. This was Anne Tyler. So I succumbed. And how glad I am. The novel is compact, distilling volumes of back-story, emotion, humor, and moving characterization into its 208 pages.

As is usually the case with Tyler’s stories, a family dynamic dominates. Mild-mannered, often misguided heroes learn life lessons and morph into authentic heroes by book’s end. So, a familiar pattern, but unique—as each of Tyler’s stories is. Aaron publishes a series of self-help books: The Beginner’s Guide to [insert topic of choice] (This is reminiscent of the series of travel guides in The Accidental Tourist). Aaron’s bossy older sister, who works at the publishing house, and his quirky staff form a protective cocoon around him after the bizarre death of his wife. How he breaks out of that cocoon to come to terms with the reality of his marriage is the core of this story.

You will cheer him because Tyler makes him such a decent, if flawed, character. And maybe, in so doing, we are cheering ourselves, knowing we, too, are flawed, but doing the best we can.

Read this little gem because it’s funny and wise and true.