Apeirogon by Colum McCann

Published by Random House on February 25, 2020

Colum McCann tells us that an apeirogon is a “shape with a countably infinite number of sides.” In a book that examines the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians, the title is apt. There are more than two “sides” to the conflict; everyone has an opinion. The novel is a balanced attempt to do justice to all the opinions by cutting through the politics and focusing on the deaths of two children, one Israeli and one Palestinian. Apeiron explores how the aftermath of those two real-world deaths illuminates the larger issues that Israel and Palestine face.

McCann tells the reader that Apeirogon is “a hybrid novel with invention at its core” that weaves together “speculation, memory, fact, and imagination.” The novel is remarkable because it is based on two remarkable people. Rami Elhanan, an Israeli, lost his daughter to suicide bombers when she was thirteen. Bassam Aramin, a Palestinian, lost his son to a Border Patrol guard when he was ten. Both men traveled on a complex internal journey before arriving at the realization that their grief was not their own, but was the same grief shared by all parents of children who die violent deaths. The realization that your enemy has feelings, the same feelings that engulf you, sparks the understanding that this person isn’t your enemy at all. A parent who lost a child is not an enemy.

The two men arrived at the same conclusion — ending the Occupation is the only way to achieve peace and justice, to prevent the senseless deaths of more children. They started Combatants for Peace to spread that message. Their position is unthinkable to people who believe they have something to gain from the Occupation. They hope to change minds, one at a time, knowing that some of their audience will refuse to listen. Both men are routinely threatened with violence because they spread a message that entrenched minds cannot bear to hear.

To oppress others is to invite violence. The truth of that statement is evident in the history of countries across the globe. Apeirogon illustrates that truth with two violent deaths. Smadar was blown to unrecoverable pieces by a Palestinian suicide bomber. The rubber bullet that crushed Abir’s skull was fired at the back of her head through a slot in an armored car from a distance of fifteen meters, an act the Israeli military first lied about (claiming she was hit by a rock) and later justified by claiming Palestinians were placing soldiers in mortal danger by throwing stones at their impenetrable vehicle. Abir likely died because the Palestinian hospital in Anata is underequipped and the fifteen-minute ambulance ride to Jerusalem was delayed by two hours at a checkpoint.

In the absence of the Occupation, neither death would likely have occurred. Arguments about the justification for violence on either side can rage until the end of time, but Rami and Bassam (and many others) have come to understand that violence will not end until the Occupation ends. Only then can a political solution be negotiated. Only when Palestinians and Israelis are equally regarded as worthy of life and liberty can peace be achieved.

The story documents the hatred with which both Rami and Bassam are routinely greeted. Some people are more comfortable feeling hatred than living without it. McCann repeatedly quotes François Mitterand’s adage, “The only interesting thing is to live,” in contexts that suggest a refinement: the only interesting thing — to live purposefully — is also a dangerous thing. Both Bassam and Rami place themselves at risk by calling for an end to the Occupation. The irony — people consumed by hate respond violently to calls for peace — is just one “interesting” aspect of living.

But Apeirogon is a novel, not a work of nonfiction. McCann imagines connections between the men that might only be apparent in a novel. A common theme in Colum McCann’s fiction is that we all share a world that connects us in many ways. In Apeirogon, an author’s note attributes to Rilke the notion that we live our lives “in widening circles that reach out across the expanse.” Apeirogon suggests some of the more violent connections. The concoction that the Israeli military sprays onto crowds from water cannons is manufactured in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The M-16 used to kill Abir was manufactured in Samaria, North Carolina. Samaria was the ancient kingdom of Israel; now there are cities and towns named Samaria in many nations. Flying over those towns are migrating birds that know no boundaries.

McCann’s novels often reach out in multiple directions for facts that, until they are assembled, might seem unrelated to the story. Apeirogon addresses, among other topics: falconry, amicable numbers, Sinéad O’Connor, tear gas delivery systems, Borges, the Kaballah, Sir Richard Francis Burton, methods of torture used in the Crusades, Einstein and Freud, swimming pools, Gandhi, German cinema during World War II, the ascetic practices of Saint Simeon, religious scrolls, Philippe Petit, the etymology of “riot” and “dextrose,” Munib Rashid al-Masri’s mansion, pomegranates, the music of John Cage, olive groves, birdsong, and Mossad’s revenge killings of poets and playwrights. The novel also pays tribute to One Thousand and One Nights, both by reference to the famous stories and by breaking the novel into 1,001 chapters (some as short as a sentence).

In the end, a novel like Apeirogon might not change the minds of people who are wedded to a position, but it manages to do something that novelists are positioned to do more skillfully than political writers: it instills feeling. It is impossible for an open-minded reader not to be moved by both Bassam and Rami. Bassam’s life changed in prison and changed again when his daughter was killed. Rami visited the site of his daughter’s death and asked himself what could be done to save other children. McCann makes palpable the suffering of both parents. The story is both moving and inspirational. If only the right people would read it and take it to heart, Apeirogon is a book that could change the world.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

Starship Alchemon by Christopher Hinz

Published by Angry Robot on November 12, 2019

Starship Alchemon combines five science fiction elements: space opera, first contact, cyborgs, time travel, and humans with psionic abilities. The plot does nothing particularly new or special with any of those elements. An old sf adage suggests that writers should only ask readers to suspend their disbelief in a single thing. Five elements may be too many — no single theme in the hodgepodge is explored in depth — but Starship Alchemon achieves limited sucess as an action story.

The science team of the Alchemon finds a living organism on a dead planet. The organism has been encased in a rocky shell that has been eroding for centuries. A spherical blue life form emerges, nicknamed Bouncy Blue by one of the science team members. The sphere seems to contain a humanoid fetus. A psychic crew member named LeaMarsa is a bit unsettled by the discovery, but the crew nevertheless brings Bouncy Blue on board, storing it in a secure lab.

Captain Ericho Solorzano commands the Alchemon, but the ship is operated by a cyborg called Jonomy Jonomy. Lt. Tomer Donner is obsessed with a corporate bigwig named Renfro Zoobondi, whose various activities include a plan to thwart chronojackers, the “temporal pirates” who steal vessels and send them forward in time, where the pirates hope to find a better future.

Donner’s unstable reaction to Bouncy Blue sets up the novel’s second half. The alien entity become less bouncy and more threatening as it sheds its shield, giving birth to Baby Blue, a gravity-defying entity that, despite its confinement to the lab, battles Jonomy for control of the ship.

LeaMarsa has psionic blackouts, causing her to float around in “the alternative universe of neurospace.” They also seem to give her a particular insight into, and perhaps a connection with, Bouncy Blue. LeaMarsa is carried away by her personal drama, which may be having a psionic impact on the rest of the crew. By the end of the novel, she’s so wrapped up in self-pity that Solorzano is worried she might become allied with Baby Blue, despite being their only hope of surviving Baby Blue’s machinations.

Christopher Hinz tells the story in prose that sometimes seems hurried and unpolished. I don’t recall his earlier work being so stylistically lackluster. The novel is apparently a rewrite of his second novel, Anachronisms, which might explain the prose issues, although I would have expected a rewrite to eliminate clunkers from the prose.

Hinz philosophizes about the “evolutionary development of the physical, emotional and intellectual components of the brain,” which he ties to “the heartland of superluminal interaction,” but it all seems like window-dressing for what is essentially an action novel: crew members struggle to survive against the alien menace that wants to take over their ship. It’s been done before, countless times, and Hinz does nothing to transcend the stale plot.

On the other hand, the story moves quickly and has some interesting moments. One aspect of the ending is predictable but the story does culminate with at least one surprise. The universe building is a bit more interesting than the characters who inhabit the universe. Starship Alchemon will appeal to sf junkies who can’t get enough space opera, but there are certainly better choices in the marketplace.

RECOMMENDED WITH RESERVATIONS

An American Spy by Olen Steinhauer

First published by Minotaur Books on March 13, 2012; reissued by Minotaur on March 3, 2020

An American Spy is the last novel in the Tourist trilogy, following The Tourist and The Nearest Exit. It could be read as a standalone, but doing so would deprive the reader of important context. This review includes spoilers concerning the second novel.

The trilogy follows Milo Weaver, who works as a Tourist for a small and very secret unit of the CIA. Tourists run around the world executing American policy by executing people whose interests do not align with American interests as judged by the people in charge of the Tourists. While they make other kinds of mischief, assassination is the key to their game.

Milo’s background — his Russian father is now running a spy agency for the United Nations, an agency so secretive that the United Nations doesn’t even know about it — is developed in The Tourist. In The Nearest Exit, Milo gets a new boss, Alan Drummond, and takes on Chinese spymaster Xin Zhu. Near the novel’s end, Zhu arranges for most of the Tourists to be murdered and for Milo to be shot.

An American Spy begins with Drummond losing his job. Drummond wants revenge against Zhu and would like Milo to join his team. When Milo says no, Drummond goes to London and then disappears. Not long after that, his wife disappears. And not long after that, Milo’s wife and daughter are gone. Milo assumes that they have all been taken by Zhu as a consequence of Drummond’s failed scheme.

Plot twists make An American Spy an engaging read, but the novel’s structure accounts for its success. While always told in the third person, the novel frequently shifts its focus, often backtracking to show events that were first perceived by one character from the perspective of a different character. In that way, the pieces of the jigsaw slowly rearrange to display a new picture, one that evolves as details are added until it becomes something quite different than it first seemed. Judging by Amazon and Goodreads reviews, a number of readers thought the changing perspectives were confusing. I thought they were the novel’s strength.

A German intelligence officer named Erica Schwartz, who plays a central role in The Nearest Exit, furnishes an early perspective in An American Spy. Milo’s sister and three surviving Tourists play important roles in the story (Letitia Jones, who exudes both sexuality and danger, also adds a bit of humor), but the perspective of Xin Zhu is the most interesting. Zhu is playing not only against Drummond and Milo, but against the Chinese government, which may have been infiltrated by an American spy. Zhu’s machinations make him seem invincible, capable of outwitting anyone. With Drummond and Milo apparently at each other’s throats, it seems that Zhu will attain supremacy in the international espionage game. Of course, the reader knows that a final plot twist will come along. The surprising resolution is a delight.

Olen Steinhauer is among the best of a very small number of American writers who consistently produce excellent espionage novels. While An American Spy wraps up the trilogy, it leaves room for the story to continue. Minotaur has reissued the trilogy, staggering the rerelease of each volume, leading up to the publication of a new installment later in March. Fans of spy fiction will welcome the return of Milo Weaver.

RECOMMENDED

The Majesties by Tiffany Tsao

First published in Australia in 2018; published by Atria Books on January 21, 2020

The Majesties is Crazy Rich Asians without the crazy. Or, at least, with a different kind of crazy. The Majesties lacks the humor of Kevin Kwan’s novel (and avoids the romantic cheese of the movie version). Instead, Tiffany Tsao purports to explore the impact of wealth on an extended Indonesian family. The Majesties is a family drama that descends into a very strange melodrama, but it takes an honest look at divisions caused by race and class in both Indonesia and America.

The story is told in the first person by Gwendolyn, who opens the novel with the revelation that her sister Estella murdered three hundred people, including herself, by poisoning their shark fin soup. Gwendolyn is the sole survivor. We later learn that this was not the first occasion on which Estella used poison to solve a problem, but Gwendolyn does not understand why her sister was motivated to wipe out so many people. The forced explanation that emerges at the end of the novel is far from convincing.

After the introductory mass murder, the novel backtracks to fill in the details of the narrator’s dysfunctional family. Estella and Gwendolyn are the granddaughters of Chinese tycoon Irwan Sulinado. The family conglomerate is based in Indonesia. Their business holdings involve textiles, agriculture, and mining, although various family members have branched out according to their interests and talents. Estella was put in charge of a profitable business that manufactures silk, although the business pretty much runs itself, leaving Estella free to live a life of fashionable frivolity. Gwendolyn founded a company called Bagatelle that makes jewelry from live insects, an idea that is sufficiently revolting to assure its success. The rest of the family is peeved that independent Gwendolyn refused to link her business to the family conglomerate.

Estella married Leonard, merging two prestigious families despite Leonard’s inability to meet the Sulinado standard of business management. His failure to turn a profit contributes to family conflict, as does his eventual decision to embrace Jesus and reject corruption (a decision that imperils family businesses that depend on corruption for their survival).

Additional family drama comes from Irwan’s remarriage to a younger woman “of humble stock” before his dead wife’s body was cold. The rest of the family treats the new grandmother as inconsequential, although she has the saving grace of being Chinese. The family insists on maintaining racial purity, despite the intermingling of a Javanese ancestor and a more recent half-Caucasian bride.

The plot moves to California when Estella and Gwendolyn discover a picture of a deceased aunt named Sandra. The picture was taken some years after the aunt’s supposed death. They decide to get to the bottom of the mystery by tracking her down.

The Majesties is refreshing in that it is not a “love conquers all” story. Sandra once studied in Australia, where she met a student from Jakarta. They began a friendship and potential romance until she discovered that, despite his physical appearance, the student was Javanese, not Chinese, and a Muslim to boot. The student resented the Chinese for their refusal to employ non-Chinese and resented his Chinese features because they impeded his hiring by Muslim employers. Still hoped to pursue the spark she felt, Sandra tries to stay in touch, but their subsequent encounters in Jakarta only gave her an opportunity to glimpse the lives lived by the city’s less fortunate residents. Thanks to Sandra’s father, friendship is difficult and romance is impossible. Sandra’s story approaches melodrama, but not nearly to the degree of Estella’s, who after all turns out to be a mass murderer.

The Majesties works best when it illuminates prejudice in circumstances that open the eyes of the privileged to the realities faced by the unfortunate. It is less successful when it chronicles the cruel dysfunctions of the Sulinado family. Gwenolyn learns that the family icons she has idolized are imperfect, but those lessons should have been apparent to her much earlier. Gwendolyn’s resolute independence is hard to square with her decision to maintain any relationship with her family at all. In any event, by the novel’s end, Gwendolyn cannot lay claim to a moral standard, making it difficult to care about her fate.

The novel’s themes will be familiar to fans of Dynasty and Dallas (Sandra’s disappearance being the dramatic equivalent of “Who shot J.R.?”). I watched Dallas as a guilty pleasure; The Majesties has a similar appeal. But just as Dallas eventually lost its way, so too the plot of The Majesties eventually derails. The climax requires the reader to rethink the story, but the sudden change of perspective is just too far over-the-top to be believable. The story steadily loses credibility, substantially offsetting its entertainment value, until it reaches a resolution that just doesn’t work. Dallas was at least meant to be cheesy; The Majesties has loftier aspirations that it never quite achieves.

RECOMMENDED WITH RESERVATIONS

Apartment by Teddy Wayne

Published by Bloomsbury Publishing on February 25, 2020

Two young writing students have been accepted into Columbia’s MFA program. Billy, from a broken home in the Midwest, bartends evenings to pay his tuition. He lacks technical proficiency but he has a raw talent for telling honest stories and an ear for dialog. The novel’s narrator comes from a more privileged, East Coast background; his father is picking up his expenses. The narrator has a strong academic understanding of fiction, but he either lacks an artist’s soul or is incapable of allowing his soul to be reflected in his work. The reader will sense that the larger problem is the narrator’s lack of self-awareness. He is a lonely young man who does not understand the root of his loneliness.

The narrator is living illegally in his aunt’s rent-controlled apartment. After Billy is the only workshop student to praise the narrator’s work, the narrator offers to let Billy stay in the apartment’s second bedroom. Billy has been sleeping in the storage room in the bar that employs him and is grateful to have a nicer place to write. The two young men are quite different — Billy loves sports, the narrator loves Must See TV — but they strike up a strong friendship. The narrator spends most of his time with Billy, viewing him as the only real friend in a lonely life. When they party together, singing along to Oasis with others in a crowded bar, the narrator realizes “there is nothing like crooning in a group to a chorus to communicate to yourselves and the world that you are young and drunk and unhindered by responsibility, that the future stretches out endlessly before you like a California highway.” When he is sober, however, the future seems less promising.

The narrator observes Billy coming out of his shell over the course of the novel. While Billy is initially worried that he will appear as a hick to New Yorkers, his good looks and natural charm allow him to fit into any crowd, even when he despises most of the people he meets for their shallow pretentiousness. The narrator envies Billy because the narrator lacks the qualities that make Billy popular. Billy, in turn, resents the ease of the narrator’s life, his reliance on a father to pay expenses rather than doing “character building” labor to pay his own way. Billy has a midwestern tendency to judge anyone harshly who fails to meet his standards of authenticity.

When Billy and the narrator bring a pair of women to their apartment, they each take one to their respective bedrooms. For the narrator, the evening is unsatisfying. Combined with other clues, that encounter leaves the impression that the narrator might be in the closet. The novel’s pivotal point occurs on the next occasion Billy and the narrator pick up two women. During a drunken moment that may or may not be accidental (the narrator’s ability to distinguish accident from intent might not be reliable), Billy forms the obvious impression that the narrator is sexually attracted to him. That moment dissolves the male bond, at least from Billy’s perspective, and causes the narrator pain that leads to the story’s climax.

Well, okay. I get it. The narrator views himself as “fundamentally defective” but lacks insight into the cause of his self-loathing. The Apartment allows the reader to feel smug for understanding the narrator better than the narrator understands himself. Beyond that, I’m not sure what the story is meant to make the reader feel. I felt little empathy for the narrator’s struggle toward self-awareness, a struggle that continues to the novel’s end, given that he seems determinedly obtuse. The only true insight he reaches is that he is a better technician than a storyteller, the same thing he was told by everyone but Billy in his workshops.

Billy is something of a midwestern stereotype, a polite homophobe with low expectations who rails against elitism but tries to be fundamentally decent in an “aw shucks” way. While the narrator will always grapple with loneliness (unless and until he comes to understand why he is lonely), people will always gravitate to Billy; his initial insecurity about living in New York is an anomaly. Yet it is difficult to square Billy’s personality with his ability to write stories that appeal to Columbia MFA students. “I can’t be friends with someone who might be gay” is an incongruous attitude for the kind of writer who would earn praise at Columbia.

The Apartment struck me as something that the novel’s narrator might write. It is technically proficient but it lacks emotional resonance. The two key characters come across as literary creations rather than actual people, and the climax (like their relationship as a whole) struck me as artificial. Teddy Wayne’s technical proficiency suffices to make the reading experience at least partially satisfying, but when I finish a book and think nothing more than “Well, okay, I get it,” I can’t give the book a heartfelt recommendation.

RECOMMENDED WITH RESERVATIONS