Thursday, September 9, 2010

Review of the Day: The Fortress of Solitude


 
The Fortress of Solitude is the story of two friends, Dylan Ebdus and Mingus Rude, growing up in Brooklyn in the 1970s. Dylan is white, Mingus is black; both are growing up without mothers. Dylan’s father is an abstract artist who views himself as a sellout for painting cover art for sci-fi novels. Mingus’s father was the front-man for a Motown harmony group, but spends his days getting high and dreaming of a comeback.

Jonathan Lethem packs so much into the story that there are times reading it is like trying to drink from a firehose of 1970s culture. Dylan spends his days collecting comic books, perfecting street games, being “yoked” by older kids for his lunch money, and trying to hold his own with graffiti taggers, including Mingus. Drugs, sex, race, music, gentrification, crime, art – its all there, but all through the eyes of a kid.

The book has the multiple storylines and hard edge of a Don DiLillo novel, but without the unrelenting grimness because it is told from the point of view of a child who still has some optimism. The best thing about the book is how Lethem perfectly captures the half-perceptions and half-understandings that make a child’s memory.

In the second half of the book, the story flags. It is 1999 and Dylan is living in Berkeley. Mingus is in prison, where he has been off and on since turning to crack. Dylan fills in the details of the years gone by, but this part of the book all builds to a harebrained scheme to get Dylan out of prison.

Unfortunately, where the first part of the book is incredible in the sense of being amazing, the second part is incredible in the sense of not being believable. Dylan uses a “magic” ring he had since childhood to sneak into the prison, with tragic consequences. The ring made sense in the first part, where its magical powers could be explained as the alcoholic delusions of the derelict who passed it on to Dylan, or the fantasies of Dylan and Mingus who wanted to be superheroes. But when Dylan actually uses the ring to become invisible, the story takes a jarring turn to magical realism.

For readers willing to take whatever a story dishes out, the second half could be as entertaining as the first. But for those not willing to suspend disbelief to the point of accepting magic rings and invisibility, the ending will be a letdown.


OTHER REVIEWS
(If you would like your review of this book listed here, leave a comment with a link to your review and I will add it.)

NOTES
I listened to the unabridged audio version of this book, which I suspect made me like it more than I would have had I read all 500+ pages. The narrator did a terrific job with all the voices and brought the kaleidoscope images into focus.

6 comments :

  1. Thanks for the review. I guess I'm still not sure if I want to read it, but at least my unsureness is better informed now.

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  2. Sheila -- I really liked the book up to the final quarter. So I can't recommend it wholeheartedly, but I really liked most of it.

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  3. Do you know - I have never listened to an audio book!! You should recommend one for me - the very best! I love reading your reviews.

    I gave your blog an award! Check it out here!

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  4. Library Cat -- I have come to love audiobooks, ever since I got an iPod. I get them all at the library on cds, download them to my iTunes library, then load up my iPod.

    I listen to all kinds of books, but I am particularly fond of classics on audio, because a good reader can really make them come alive. For one thing, the reader has parsed out those page-long paragraphs and made sense of the sentences, for another, a good reader will make the characters interesting with distinctive voices.

    So, for instance, Dickens books are excellent on audio and there seem to be a lot of them at the library. And The Count of Monte Cristo was terrific. I never would have gotten to all 1,800+ pages in a book book.

    But for a great contemporary audiobook, I suggest Middlesex by Jeffry Eugenides. If you haven't already read the book, the audio version is incredible. The author was amazing. I think he won some kind of audiobook award for it.

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  5. I agree with you about Dickens on audiobook. I also recommend Stephen King. Those have been my 2 successful outings.

    I must read some Jonathan Lethem. I keep saying that...

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  6. Bybee -- I loved Motherless Brooklyn, and really liked most of this one. So I will definitely read more of Lethem's books.

    Stephen King, on the other hand, I don't know. I really, really do not like scary.

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