Title: Well-written, but I see what many are saying . . .
Review: First off, this novel never gets boring, which is quite an achievement for something so long. Chabon does an impressive job of telling the tale of two cousins with different backgrounds. Yet while the story and delivery are first-rate, there isn't exactly a literary message per se beyond keys, locks and imprisonment, be this last of the physical, social, mental or emotional sort. Sure, you could go back and write a book report about that sort of symbolism, but you don't really come away from the novel the same way you might with "Catcher in the Rye," "The Heart is a Lonely Hunter," "Elmer Gantry" or "The Great Gatsby," but then those have weathered the test of time and "Kavalier and Clay" might suffer from being a work of contemporary fiction in that regard. What author who writes today really attains that kind of status in the here and now? Irving, Updike and Cormac McCarthy . . . maybe.
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