Motherless Brooklyn by Jonathan Lethem Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of Motherless Brooklyn
Book Review: A page-turner by the master of Brooklyn.
Summary: 5 Stars
You might think a writer could not construct a brilliantly-worded, completely engaging detective story centering around a protagonist with Tourette syndrome. You'd be wrong. Lethem is a brilliant author who writes books you just can't set down once you have been lucky (or informed) enough to pick one up. Lethem writes about Brooklyn as Dennis Lehane (e.g. Gone, Baby, Gone (Harper Fiction)) writes about Boston---with the authority of experience. In regard to what Lethem says he loves most of books are "the mysterious movements of characters and situations and the emotions that accompany those movements." THAT is why you read Lethem. Because his writing is true to his passion and it makes his books incredibly entertaining and intriguing.Book Review: A remarkable insight
Summary: 5 Stars
Lionel is one of four boys from a Brooklyn orphanage enlisted to help the young Frank Minna, Lionel is then thirteen years old. When the boys eventually leave school Franks takes the boys on full time as he establishes is rather shady detective agency which operates under the cover of a limo service. It is some fifteen years after Lionel first encountered Frank that they are on a surveillance which leads to Frank being murdered. Lionel takes on the task of seeking vengeance for the death of the nearest thing he has had to a father.
The story covers the early period of the boys employment and then picks up at the time of the ill fated surveillance, and Lionel's subsequent hunt for the murderer. Not sure who to trust, even amongst his three fellow orphans or anywhere else, Lionel works more or less alone, on more than one occasion putting himself in serious danger. Lionel narrates the account in the first person.
The plot alone would make an interesting novel, but what makes this story special is that Lionel is no ordinary boy, he suffers from Tourett'es syndrome, and is prone to tics, frequent verbal outbusts often of made up words, counting and obsessions with numbers, and touching people. A condition which confuses most people he meets as most are not familiar with the condition. In Lionel Jonathan Lethem has created a remarkable character, one who is appealing and who immediately engenders our sympathy. This is done entirely through the inner person that is Lionel; it would have been easy to make Lionel physically endearing, but rather Letham chooses to make him a large and rather ordinary looking person. The result is that his affliction becomes the source of his appeal.
Motherless Brooklyn is a well written and captivating and moving story, but more than that it is a story about a remarkable character. It also provides a vivid insight into the condition known as Tourette's syndrome.
Book Review: An Original and Highly Entertaining Detective Story
Summary: 4 Stars
Never have I met such a unique character in a mystery novel. Lionel Essrog has Tourette's. A Brooklyn orphan from St. Vincent's Home for Boys, Lionel grows up emulating small-time mobster Frank Minna. Now in his 30s, Lionel works for Minna's limo service and detective agency along with other orphans, the self-proclaimed Minna Men. When Minna turns up dead, Lionel is determined to find the killer. This story involves all the kinds of enigmatic characters one would expect from a classic detective novel: two elderly mobsters, a Buddhist, a Giant, and Minna's widow. Nevertheless, it's the way the story is told that makes the book so intriguing. Author Jonathan Lethem's writing style is so fluid and crisp. You can't help but get caught up in the story. The first chapter begins with the circumstances surrounding Minna's death. The next chapter delves back into Lionel's past and explains why Minna's death means so much to him. The latter chapters trace Lionel's investigation and his journey to find out who he is without Frank Minna. This was truly a treat!Book Review: An excellent book
Summary: 5 Stars
I thoroughly enjoyed this book about a detective/small-time mobster who has turrette's. The dialogue is fresh and fast-paced, as is the action. The only flaw with the book - it ends.Book Review: An inventive and enjoyable read.
Summary: 5 Stars
There was little I didn't like about this book. It kept me guessing, it was unique, funny, sad and disturbing all at the same time and the pages turned quickly, plus it had one of the funniest scenes I've ever encountered in a book when, while shopping, the main character who has Tourette's Syndrome comes upon a magazine with Prince on the cover and he tries to pronounce the symbol out loud.