A review by offbalance80
Manhattan Beach by Jennifer Egan
3.0
As January is the middle of peak awards season, I keep hearing the term "Oscar bait." For those of you who are not cinephiles like me, it refers to films that appear to have been produced for the sole purpose of netting its cast and crew a bucket of pretty gold trophies that seem to be handed out in large quantities during these colder months. While Manhattan Beach isn't a movie (yet), I definitely felt like I was reading some Oscar bait. That's not necessarily a bad thing, mind you - I do enjoy costume dramas with serious themes - but so much of this book felt like a check list for the next award season (disabled sister! missing father! Roaring Twenties and Depression flashbacks! overcoming misogynistic obstacles! World War II! - Someone call Saoirse Ronan - we may have her next part yet.). I guess we don't label melodramas as melodramas anymore, but that's what this was - a sweeping, epic, (enjoyable! )melodrama. All it needed was a crack cinematographer and a lush score (Hans Zimmer, maybe?) and we're all set.
The writing is absolutely beautiful, and the storytelling far more focused than the gimmicky and scattershot "A Letter From the Goon Squad" (which I hated and the rest of the world loved). The historical pieces are well-researched and the characters reasonably well drawn, and fans of New York history will be especially thrilled by Egan's use of the Navy Yard and the area around it (as well as areas of Brooklyn oft overlooked). Still, I was deeply annoyed by the ending, which cemented this book into the realm of melodrama (it looked like it could have gone a number of different ways towards the middle), but I enjoyed the trip there. You may as well.
The writing is absolutely beautiful, and the storytelling far more focused than the gimmicky and scattershot "A Letter From the Goon Squad" (which I hated and the rest of the world loved). The historical pieces are well-researched and the characters reasonably well drawn, and fans of New York history will be especially thrilled by Egan's use of the Navy Yard and the area around it (as well as areas of Brooklyn oft overlooked). Still, I was deeply annoyed by the ending, which cemented this book into the realm of melodrama (it looked like it could have gone a number of different ways towards the middle), but I enjoyed the trip there. You may as well.