Moonglow by Michael Chabon
In 1989, fresh from the publication of his first novel, The Mysteries of Pittsburgh, Michael Chabon traveled to his mother's home in Oakland, California, to visit his terminally ill grandfather. Tongue loosened by powerful painkillers, memory stirred by the imminence of death, Chabon's grandfather shared recollections and told stories the younger man had never heard before, uncovering bits and pieces of a history long buried and forgotten.
Moonglow unfolds as the deathbed confession, made to his grandson, of a man the narrator refers to only as "my grandfather." It is a tale of madness, of war and adventure, of sex and desire and ordinary love, of existential doubt and model rocketry, of the shining aspirations and demonic underpinnings of American technological accomplishment at mid-century and, above all, of the destructive impact - and the creative power - of the keeping of secrets and the telling of lies.
A gripping, poignant, tragicomic, scrupulously researched and wholly imaginary transcript of a life that spanned the dark heart of the twentieth century, Moonglow ranges from the Jewish slums of prewar South Philadelphia to the invasion of Germany, from a Florida retirement village to New York's Wallkill Prison, from the heyday of the space program to the twilight of 'the American Century'. Collapsing an era into a single life and a lifetime into a single week, Moonglow is a lie that tells the truth, a work of fictional non-fiction, an autobiography wrapped in a novel disguised as a memoir.
Moonglow is Chabon at his most daring, his most moving, his most Chabonesque.
About the Author
Michael Chabon is the bestselling and Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Mysteries of Pittsburgh, Wonder Boys, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, Summerland (a novel for children), The Final Solution, The Yiddish Policemen's Union, and Gentlemen of the Road, as well as the short story collections A Model World and Werewolves in Their Youth and the essay collections Maps and Legends and Manhood for Amateurs. He is the chairman of the board of the MacDowell Colony.
He lives in Berkeley, California, with his wife, the novelist Ayelet Waldman, and their children.
Hardback | 448 pages
162 x 243 x 39mm | 686g
21 Nov 2016
HarperCollins Publishers (Australia) Pty Ltd
New South Wales, Australia
1460753224
9781460753224
Condition: Good
A book that has been read but is in good condition. Very minimal damage to the cover including very minor (barely visible) scuff marks, but no holes or tears. The dust jacket has sadly been lost and is NOT included. The majority of pages are undamaged with no creasing or tearing, no pencil underlining of text, no highlighting of text, no writing in margins. There is a single, very small blob (raindrop size) of discolouring that's visible on the first four pages in the book. No other discolouring anywhere else in the book. No missing pages. The book is in excellent condition and would have been listed as in a Very Good condition if not for the missing dust jacket.