This is not a horror novel. If that's all you read, stop reading this review. If you want a good book that isn't horror, this is excellent.
I'm a fan of McInherney's and have been for quite the number of years. Every review that I've read about The Good Life has started off talking about Bright Lights, Big City and now that I've mentioned it, so did this one. But thats it. BLBC was good, this is better.
Over the years, Jay's writing has matured. He wrote Ransom, which was interesting if not a little dull and he wrote Brightness Falls, Model Behavior and The Last of the Savages. Last of the Savages is my personal favorite because for the first time, he was writing something I could relate to. It was like A Separate Peace for people born later than the 1940s. I've re-read it several times, but that's nothing new. I've reread all of Jay's novels several times over the years.
Brightness Falls was also terrific, even if I can't relate to rich people. He drew an enormous, ambitious canvas full of people populating a strange little age, Manhatten in the 1980s when everyone was contemplating taking over everyone else. Thems was the days when minnows could literally swallow whales and Russell, the protagonist, literally started a takeover on a credit card.
Now, with The Good Life, we revisit Russell and Corrine as well as a number of other characters, this time populating Manhatten post-911. The actual day (9/11/01) is given relative short shrift, probably because it is too big and also because it isn't really relevent. Its relevancy, as far as the book is concerned, is in its after-effects, a keen observation on Mr. McInherney's part.
This one I can relate to. I was in the WTC ten minutes before the attack and I watched the crashes and explosions from my office across the street on the 18th floor. My windows were blown out by the towers falling and my building served as a morgue as they were recovering bodies. I watched as a piece of burning building fell on my boss' car and blew it up. He was right next to me.
And in the uncertain days thereafter, it was like twilight zone in NYC and thats what its like in The Good Life. Suddenly, veils were lifted, people reprioritized for a while and NYC became a somewhat friendlier place. That's all well behind us now, but for a little while, we got ourselves reminded of what was important and what was possible.
Russell and Corrine's story is less front and center than it was in Brightness Falls, but then again, those days, everyone's story got moved to the backburner.
But with Russell having an affair and Corrine contemplating it, the stories are imbued with a more-than-human urgency and message.
Its a terrific novel, and one that I plan to re-read.
Last, the pictures on the hardcover are pretty hard hitting. There's actually three of them (cover, spine, back) and its some of the most amazing pictures from 9/11 I've ever seen. Someone should put out an art book with similar pictures.
|
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
Bookmarks