(no subject)

[decemberthirty]

I finished Kavalier and Clay yesterday. What a book! I don't know if there's anything I can really say about it other than that it is fantastic, absolutely deserving of its Pulitzer, and certainly one of the best books I have read in several years. I am now very interested in reading some of Chabon's other work to see how it compares. There are just so many aspects of Kavalier and Clay that blow me away. Chabon's prose is lively, intelligent, and versatile, and his characterization is just unbelievable. I reacted to the characters in this book in a way that reminds me of what I used to feel as a kid when I would read a book and wish so passionately that the characters were real so that I could talk to them and become their friend. I also really loved the way Chabon subtly subtly built up the unspoken sexual tension between Sammy and Tracy Bacon. Nothing was ever said openly, but by the time Bacon kissed Sammy in the Empire State Building, I was just aching for it to happen. That is an effect that I desperately want to create in my own book.

There are, of course, critical thoughts that I could be having about this book, intelligent remarks that I could make about what makes the book so effective, slight flaws that I could puzzle over, but I don't want to do any of that right now. I don't want to step back from it; I'm not ready yet to attain the kind of detachment that is necessary for that kind of thing. I've been swept off my feet, and I just want to enjoy that for a little while longer.

Wow.