1 of 1 members found this review helpful.
“ Well, I was going to write a short plesant review but then I read some of other people's reviews that are either complaining that the novel is neither a thriller nor a science fiction novel or making vaguely antisemitic remarks (even people who like it!)
This book is an alternate history take on the author's own childhood where he imagines what life might have been like for him and his family had Charles Linbergh become President and The United States never entered World War II
Had I been alive at the time I would have probably have taken the same stance that Linbergh took but that isn't the point. Because we now have the benefit of hindsight we have forgotten how powerful a hold antisemitic views had on the American public at the time of the war. We believe that we fought the war to halt the holocaust when in truth we had no idea what was being done to Jews in Germany at the time and didn't realize our own bigotry until afterward.
Roth's alternate history is subtle but shocking as we watch the country embark on a folksy antisemitism.
The novel's one flaw is that it's premise is too large an idea to give much shape to the coming of age narrative he has presented and the two elements fight it out between them. If ever a book cried out for a sequel this one is it. ”
Robephiles wrote this review Wednesday, January 14 2009.
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