The Thumbnail Book Reviews
by John Q McDonald --- 14 June 2010
by T. C. Boyle
The business of writing is, perhaps, more fraught than others with the petty rivalries, jealousies and petulance that come in a competitive industry full of strong artistic personalities and egos. This is a major theme of Boyle's novel, set largely within an artists' community on Tupelo Island along the coast of Georgia south of Savannah (and which resembles, at least in part, the real Sapelo Island). Ruth Dershowitz is a minor writer, who has had a story or two published in the small press. At the Thanatopsis community (which name puts this reader in mind of Evelyn Waugh's Aimée Thanatogenos in The Loved One), Ruth is surrounded by larger lights than hers, and she struggles to make herself an integral part of this artistic community of which she so desperately wishes to be a part. Meanwhile, off the coast, a young Japanese man jumps ship and swims ashore on Tupelo Island. He is young, confused, a man of mixed identity having been born of a Japanese mother and American hippie father. Hiro Tanaka seeks to live in the great mythical melting pot that is America. But first, he must survive Tupelo Island. Ruth and her lover, Saxby, the fish-obsessed son of the founder of Thanatopsis, witness Hiro's desperate swim ashore. Soon, his fate is tied up with Ruth's dreams of literary glory and what unfolds is an intricate and somewhat frantic chase around Tupelo, and eventually the Okeefenokee swamps of southern Georgia.
Boyle is a crafty writer in that the details of his crafting of this story are evident on every page. The tale is intricately woven and its language is fast-moving, often funny, and has a breezy frenetic quality. We see that Ruth is writing a story about a Japanese mother who drowns herself in the sea. Hiro reflects on his own mother's death and his dreams of living in the City of Brotherly Love. Ruth also has the opportunity to confront a woman who rose from the same writers workshop, but who became famous and glamorous on the basis of her sex-driven prose. We get to see her work through Ruth's jealousies, while recognizing a fundamental truth about art and showmanship, that being that the glitziest story-teller gets all the attention. To some extent, that is part of the character of T. C. Boyle's career. He is a gifted story teller and he is a bit of a showman, and he tells here a ripping yarn about Hiro's introduction to America and its attendant confusion and violence. He gives us an insecure Ruth who nevertheless isn't above using Hiro for her own career advancement. It is a somewhat sordid tale with almost inevitably tragic results. In the end, Boyle's story is a frantic coming-to-America tale entangled with a portrait of low-stakes literary life.
Also by Boyle: [Drop City]