There’s nothing in common between these two books, other than they’re both new and large in page count. I consider the length a good thing, considering my overwhelming urge to get lost in another world right now. One’s fiction, the other history.
I loved Mark Helprin’s A Winter’s Tale, especially the white horse. I’ve always remembered when it was imprisoned in a mill, turning a central shaft, harnessed to a beam and walking circles for cruel masters: And “… so that he might return to the place from which he had come, he kept turning it, and he refused to die.” If you have read the book, likely you’ll remember that scene. No white horses or fantasy that I’m aware of in Helprin’s new novel. The Oceans and the Stars: A Sea Story, a War Story, a Love Story features a Navy captain near the end of a decorated career whose opinions put him at odds with the U.S. President. The bad vibe gets him assigned to a humiliating post, but he takes the new assignment in stride, commanding Patrol Coastal Ship 15, the Athena. From the book’s description: “Soon thereafter, he is deployed on a mission that subjects his integrity, morality, and skill to the ultimate test, and ensures that Athena will live forever in the annals of the Navy.” A love interest exists with attorney Katy Farrar, “with whom he falls in last-chance love.” Helprin is a master when it comes to creating epic stories with exquisite prose. Fingers crossed for this one.
This seems like a fascinating deep dive into an unimaginable disaster of the kind we witnessed this summer in Canada. The Burning of the World: The Great Chicago Fire and the War for a City’s Soul is about the sweeping wild fire that destroyed the city of Chicago in October 1871. “The effects of the Great Fire were devastating. But they were also transforming,” according to the book’s description. “Out of the ashes, faster than seemed possible, rose new homes, tenements, hotels, and civic buildings, as well as a new political order.” I’m gathering from the description the reconstruction became a boiling pot of political issues between the elite and the working-class Chicagoans. In Publishers Weekly, the forecast says the book includes “lively” character portraits, including those of influential Tribune publisher Joseph Medill; dry goods retailer Marshall Field; and real estate tycoon Potter Palmer. The magazine also says Berg’s book is “vivid and immersive.” I like reading about Chicago, so I’m looking forward to this.
The Longest Chapter 