reviews - Jewish Book Council

REVIEWS
Fiction
are protesting, campuses are in revolt, and
student Lenny Spiegel becomes involved with
a draft resistance movement, ARMS. This
novel traces Lenny’s journey from America to
Sweden to join a group of draft resisters and
pose as the leader of the group, Aaronson,
while the real Aaronson makes a mysterious
trip to Germany. Lenny’s physical resemblance
to Aaronson, and his willingness to
become involved in the resistance movement,
...Lenny’s long awaited revelation
of the truth is eye opening.
is a political mystery with a touch of Kafka.
His motivation is to do a good deed in the
anti-war movement, but his grasp of political
reality is näive. Lenny is spiritually and emotional
adrift and the allure of being part of a
larger movement appeals to him at a time of
emotional vulnerability. The ending has a
surprise twist and Lenny’s long awaited revelation
of the truth is eye opening.
The characters are well developed but the
plot drags in spots. Overall an interesting
story of the height of the student anti-war
movement and the community life in Sweden
where they fled to avoid the military draft. BA
GONE TO THE DOGS:
A NOVEL
Mary Guterson
St. Martin’s Griffin, 2009. 278 pp. $13.99
ISBN: 978-0-312-54179-8
Breaking up with boyfriend Brian leads 30something
Rena to examine her life. And
did I mention, to steal his new girlfriend’s dog?
In order to extricate herself from the past, and
to return the dog to its owner, she relies on
help from friends and family. These include
divorced parents who dine together weekly,
former drug-dealing sister turned religious,
well-grounded friend Lisa, and platonic new
flame, Chaim (Chuck). Through the characters,
Guterson explores when relationships
begin, how they end, and which ones endure.
“Odd souls need each other, whether they
want each other or not,” Rena muses.
Examining relationships in this book
extends to self-regard. Having given up on
48 Jewish Book World Spring 5770/2010
becoming a speechwriter, Rena admits, “I’m a
waitress in a steakhouse with no future career
prospects. I have a pushy mother. I have one
failed relationship under my belt. I have no
confidence in myself. I’m a criminal. You do
the math.” Yet throughout Gone to the Dogs, she
becomes the heroine of her narrative. Bridget
Jones Crossing Delancey best describes Rena.
Family interactions also humorously expose the
mores of modern Jewish life. Readers who have
been there, if you know what I mean, will smile
while recognizing themselves in the novel. NL
GOOD FOR THE JEWS
Debra Spark
University of Michigan Press, 2009. 264 pp. $24.00
ISBN: 978-0-472-1171-6
This is the story of a small group of characters
in Madison, Wisconsin whose lives are
intertwined through work, family, and romantic
associations. The main characters are loosely
based on biblical figures from the Story of
Esther. “Ellen” is “Esther,” an orphan who lost
her parents and is fostered by her cousin
“Mose”/“Mordechai”. “Alex” is the superintendent
for schools and is the stand-in for King
“Ahasuerus.” He was formerly married to
“Valerie” (“Vashti”), director of Madison’s Center
for Artistic Exchange, but becomes involved
with Ellen, who works in daycare. “Hyman,”
the new school principal is “Haman” and an
anti-Semite who plots the removal of Mose,
American History teacher at the progressive
school for at-risk children.
This fast paced, contemporary tale demonstrates
how each character’s early history
informs who they are, how they view the
world, and how they respond and interact
with others. And though Spark vividly reveals
the deleterious and devastating effects that
interpersonal relations can create, in delineating
each person’s past she almost seems apologetic
for individual shortcomings. As she concludes:
“So, what of it?... Ellen didn’t know,
though at moments she imagined herself and
the others as hapless actors, unwittingly cast in
some biblical story, where being right meant
being rewarded and being rewarded meant
demolishing your enemy.” KJH
Rafael Yglesias
Scribner, 2009. 369 pp. $26.00
ISBN: 978-1-4391-0230-5
A HAPPY MARRIAGE
This heartbreaking, joyous autobiographical
novel oscillates between love and loss. It
begins on the night the narrator meets his wife
of 30 years; in the next chapter we see her in her
final illness. As successive chapters go back and
forth in time, we come to know them and their
marriage intimately. And not just them. His
alter ego’s Jewish mother and Latin father, and
his Jewish in-laws from Long Island, are memorable
personalities too. Yglesias limns detailed
portraits of even minor characters, like a doorman,
hospice physician or couples therapist.
Yglesias, like the late John Updike, has the
uncanny ability to describe the moment-tomoment
feelings of his characters in precise
and graceful language, often with astute similes.
The in-laws “reacted to feelings as if they
were brand-new purchases that didn’t fit the
room for which they were bought.” After
charming his future wife’s college friends, the
protagonist “felt as if he had been welcomed
into a friendly foreign land.”
A reader becomes the confidante of a talented,
passionate, touchingly insecure man
who is delighted by and profoundly devoted
to a singular woman. The story of their life
together leaves an indelible impression of
them and their love. BG
Hesh Kestin
Dzanc Books, 2009. 370 pp. $16.95
ISBN: 978-0976717782
THE IRON WILL OF
SHOESHINE CATS
Twenty-two year old orphaned student
Russell Newhouse is introduced to
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