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The Last Flight of Poxl West

Daniel Torday (Goodreads Author)

3.47 · Rating details · 806 ratings · 153 reviews

A stunning novel from award-winning author Daniel Torday, in which a young man recounts his idolization of his Uncle Poxl, a Jewish, former-RAF pilot, exploring memory, fame and story-telling.

All his life, Elijah Goldstein has idolized his charismatic Uncle Poxl. Intensely magnetic, cultured and brilliant, Poxl takes Elijah under his wing, introducing him to opera and art ...more

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Hardcover, 304 pages

Published March 17th 2015 by St. Martin's Press

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Jan 03, 2015 Diane S ☔ rated it really liked it

A Jewish teenager, Elijah, reveres the older man who is his Uncle Poxl. This man has time for him, takes him to museums, discusses art and literature with him and tells him stories of his life during the war. This is the bare bones of the story but this is a story within a story and telling more would ruin this book for future readers.

There is something so tender in the way this is written, the characters so likable. The art of storytelling, the interpretation of memory, experiences and regrets, ...more

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Dec 19, 2017 Rebecca McNutt rated it really liked it

Shelves: history, fiction, war, ww2

The Last Flight of Poxl West is an excellent novel, exploring the ways in which history can easily be romanticized, even if there's an underlying darker truth beneath it. It's great WWII fiction but more than that, it's the story of love and how it can become misdirected.

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Sep 21, 2014 Robin Black rated it it was amazing

I had the joy of reading this pre-publication and trust me, this is a book you want to read. More in a bit as I sort through what is and what isn't a spoiler, but for now just Hooray!!

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Oct 14, 2016 Carlos Peguer rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: 2016

Os pongo en situación: este libro es una novela que intercala dos historias. La primera, en una época un poco más moderna, nos cuenta la historia de Eli y la admiración que siente por su tío Poxl West, que recientemente ha publicado un libro superventas sobre su experiencia como piloto de la RAF durante la Segunda Guerra Mundial. Y como ya os imaginaréis, la otra línea argumental es el susodicho libro.

Casi al principio, poco después de la publicación del libro del tío Poxl, un estudiante univers ...more

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Mar 22, 2016 switterbug (Betsey) rated it really liked it

Joan Jett once sang that “Everybody needs a hero,” which is certainly the truth for fifteen-year-old Eli Goldstein, who is searching for a touchstone to transcend his Jewish consciousness, in 1980s Boston. His hippie-ish rabbi in Hebrew school has tried to turn him on to the kabbalah, but Eli worships his surrogate Uncle Poxl, a flamboyant and charismatic scholar, and a bomber pilot in WW II. During museum, opera, and symphony outings, Poxl taught Eli to appreciate the finer nuances of art; over Joan Jett once sang that “Everybody needs a hero,” which is certainly the truth for fifteen-year-old Eli Goldstein, who is searching for a touchstone to transcend his Jewish consciousness, in 1980s Boston. His hippie-ish rabbi in Hebrew school has tried to turn him on to the kabbalah, but Eli worships his surrogate Uncle Poxl, a flamboyant and charismatic scholar, and a bomber pilot in WW II. During museum, opera, and symphony outings, Poxl taught Eli to appreciate the finer nuances of art; over sundaes at Cabot’s, Eli became the “constant listener” of Poxl’s manuscript pages of his (as yet) unpublished memoir, Skylock, about his time with the British RAF. Uncle Poxl became Eli’s mentor and first demonstrable Jewish hero.

However, Poxl’s story as Jewish witness to the War is also a confession of betrayal to the women he loved the most, including his mother, who he left behind in Eastern Europe during the Anschluss. Knowing his mother was sent to a concentration camp “was like imagining every star in the sky blotted out by some small boy with a pin whose touch extinguishes each light.” His bombing missions over Germany, we read, “had wrested fate from the inevitable bearing down of history.” Hence, Poxl’s revenge on the Nazis.

Poxl West, aka Leopold Weisberg, is a Czechoslovakian émigré who became a bomber pilot for the British RAF during WW II, leaving more than one lover behind in his wake. Once his memoir was published, he became an overnight literary sensation, but he also cut a dashing Errol Flynn-ish figure as a bomber pilot over Nazi Germany and lover of tragic women. The memoir is included in full, told in alternating sections with Eli’s story. Eli is now an adult, looking back on his adolescent years, and trying to come to terms with his own perceptions of memory, history, and betrayal. Poxl never sent the signed copies of his memoir to Eli as promised, which was just the first in a series of disappointments.

Eli’s narration provides an examination of the core of narration itself, and a searching depiction of love, told by way of a story within a story, two narratives in counterpoint to each other, but both accounts yearning to legitimize the transformation of personal odysseys. And how do we reconcile historical fact with personal truth? As Eli recalls, listening to his uncle read the memoir out loud to him, “It was as if he was crafting his great account before my eyes, and I don’t know that I’ve been so close to history since.”

I have only a few complaints, which register as minor against the scope of the novel’s merit. The memoir itself, outside of the second narrative, doesn’t strike me as a book that would become an overnight sensation in the 1980s. It may be a moving addition to the many Holocaust memoirs that have preceded it, but it doesn’t exactly break new ground, at least not proportional to its colossal success. Also, Skylock was considered too sexually graphic, which puzzled me. It was actually rather tame for the 1980s. And, Torday gets a little heavy-handed with clichés at times, but it is eclipsed by the bounty of painterly and poetic images.

Torday combines the structure of the novel with its theme, which rests on a twist that both undermines and underscores the memoir. As Poxl was recounting of the love of his life, a prostitute and singer of harmonies: “There was something to the act of harmonizing itself that smacked of precision: two voices doing two different things, diverging so they might come together as one, greater than either alone.” And that’s exactly what Torday does with this accomplished novel. ...more

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Jan 16, 2015 Esil rated it really liked it

Shelves: netgalley

Thank you to St Martin's Press and Netgalley for an opportunity to read an advance copy of The Last Flight of Poxl West. It's a narrative within a narrative. Eli recounts the story of his relationship with his "uncle" Poxl, a family friend who wrote a memoir about his experience as a Jewish fighter pilot during WWII. Eli idolizes Poxl and his stories. Interspersed with Eli's narrative is Poxl's memoir of his time during the war and just after. I really liked Eli's narrative and parts of Poxl's m ...more

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Jun 24, 2015 Barb added it

Shelves: wwii, post-wwii, uncles, vine, gave-it-a-try-and-then-gave-up

I was excited to read this novel. The story of a Jewish WWII RAF pilot who goes on to publish his memoirs more than forty years after the war, sounded interesting. Poxl West, born Leopold Weisberg, tells a story within a story, as we read his memoir as well as his nephew's narrative set in 1986 as Poxl's book is published.

I was eager to be taken back in time and learn about Poxl's experiences during the war but half way through I realized the past didn't come alive for me, I wasn't engaged by th ...more

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Apr 05, 2015 Mark rated it liked it

Because he last eighty pages or so of this novel are so good, I regretted that I didn't find the first 200 pages more compelling. I was never convinced that the mock memoir that lies at the heart of this novel (occupying 70-80% of the pages) could really have caused the stir among the reading public that occurs in the novel. However, as the novel comes to a close, we alternate more frequently between Poxl West's memoir which is centered around World War II, and the 1980's story of Poxl's nephew ...more

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Nov 11, 2015 Sylvia Abrams rated it liked it

The last Flight if Poxl West is a troubling story. Told as a memoir within a novel, the plot revolves around the flawed hero, Leopoldo Weisberg,, aka Poxl West. The narrator of the novel is Elijah, Poxl's young nephew. I liked the sections in the voice of Eli. They rang true as the young boy who idolized his uncle matures into a man who realizes his uncle's flaws. Less successful, in my view, is the memoir. Why Poxl found Francoise to be his true love was not convincing at all. Her tawdry charac ...more

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Jan 05, 2015 Jessica Jeffers rated it liked it

Shelves: fiction, netgalley

This was fine, but a little underwhelming. Maybe just because I figured out where it was going about a third of the way through? I dunno. A longer review to come.

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Feb 15, 2015 Wendy Cosin rated it really liked it

Shelves: ww-ii

The Last Flight of Poxl West alternates between two related stories - a World War II “memoir” and a story about a relationship between young Elijah Goldstein and his uncle Poxl. This structure breaks up the story nicely and provides needed perspective to the memoir sections, which make up most of the novel. In summary, The Last Flight of Poxl West is a good story and extremely well-written, with characters that experience deep emotions and complex moral issues.

Eli, a Jewish teenager in Boston, w The Last Flight of Poxl West alternates between two related stories - a World War II “memoir” and a story about a relationship between young Elijah Goldstein and his uncle Poxl. This structure breaks up the story nicely and provides needed perspective to the memoir sections, which make up most of the novel. In summary, The Last Flight of Poxl West is a good story and extremely well-written, with characters that experience deep emotions and complex moral issues.

Eli, a Jewish teenager in Boston, whose grandparents immigrated from Europe, whose parents are modestly successful professionals, loves and idealizes his Uncle Poxl, who is “a writer and an artist and a war hero”. The extent of Eli’s hero worship is shown when Poxl reads from his memoir: “And when he finally gave us what we wanted - and that audience wanted so much from Poxl West, the first Jew so many of us had heard of who had not only survived the Nazi threat but had combated it, literally - and narrated what happened the night he crawled into the cockpit of a Lancaster bonber, when he piloted a plane so that his bomb aimer could drop blockbuster bombs that created a firestorm that destroyed almost every building in Hamburg, it was as if every villain in God’s unholy world had been burned in the caldron of fire my uncle Poxl had lit.” That’s a lot to live up to, and Eli’s first person narrative is about his projections and disappointments, as well as the importance of stories. Eli is a likeable and believable character.

Poxl’s memoir tells of his departure from pre-war Czechoslovakia, his romantic adventures in Rotterdam and London, and achievement of his dream to fly for the RAF against the Nazi’s. It is very well-written. I felt completely absorbed in Poxl’s experiences during the war and his feelings about his mother and the women he loved. I was most interested in the details about living in London during the bombings and his experiences in the RAF. My only criticism of the book is that I found the romantic longings a bit over-the-top, but since it is the story of a young man I can accept it for what it is. ...more

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Nov 29, 2016 Patti rated it liked it

Eli is a teenager who adores his uncle, Poxl West, who is not really a relative but is more of a grandfather figure to Eli. When Poxl writes a memoir of his experiences during WWII, Eli is miffed that he never receives his signed copy, but still he reads the book several times and uses it as a basis for school assignments. This novel contains the entire text of Poxl’s memoir, and this book-within-a-book is the real meat of this novel. Poxl, a Jew, flees Czechoslovakia for the Netherlands as a yo ...more

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May 23, 2015 Oswego Public Library District added it

Shelves: historical-fiction, literary-fiction

This debut novel by David Torday employs a story-within-a-story plot device to dramatic effect. Beginning with the narration of Elijah Goldstein, a fifteen-year-old student, it recounts his relationship with his uncle Leopold Weisberg, known as Poxl West. Poxl introduces him to cultural life around Boston --opera, symphony, literature and art. As Elijah learns more about Poxl’s early life and exploits during World War II, his feelings progress from love and admiration to hero worship. He also de ...more

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Mar 25, 2015 Tina rated it really liked it

Shelves: 2015, iwantmichikosjob

I really liked this book! It begins in the perspective of a 15-year-old Jewish teenager, Elijah Goldstein, growing up in Boston in the '80s, who idolizes his Uncle Poxl, a Czech Jew who was an RAF pilot in WWII. The novel then switches to Poxl's recently released war memoir and moves back and forth between the viewpoints as it goes on. I loved the interplay of the two very distinct voices of Eli and Poxl, with both of them strong enough to engage you equally. At first, I thought I wouldn't like ...more

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Dec 08, 2014 Christopher Roblodowski rated it it was amazing

I would like to thank Bookbrowse for this beautiful book. The focus of the story is a novel written by the protagonist's uncle, Poxl West. The fact that Poxl West is not his real uncle is revealed in the very first paragraph. It is in some ways a foreshadowing of things to come in Daniel Torday's brilliant examination of the memoir novel. The novel alternates between chapters narrating what is happening with the characters in the story, and chapters of Poxl’s memoir. This approach really worked ...more

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May 20, 2015 Hella Comat rated it it was amazing

Yes, the main reason I was interested in this book was because it had an airplane on the cover.... It's two stories told simultaneously. One is about a young Jewish boy who is taken under the wing of his uncle, who he adores. The other story is the text of a book the uncle wrote of his coming of age during WWII. The facts about living in London during the invasion of Britain were horrific - people living in subways and caves and the huge amount of destruction. Of course it was the same in German ...more

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Dec 08, 2014 Alana Cheshire rated it it was amazing

Shelves: first-reads

***Received through a Goodreads Giveaway***

An extraordinary novel that explores glory, redemption, and our omnipresent need as humans to tell the stories we tell. This is a war story that isn't predominately about war; rather, the fighting is the backdrop of Poxl's story, not the thesis of it. The result is an intriguing narrative that is unafraid to stray from our typically black-and-white hindsight impressions of WWII, and makes a compelling distinction between what is true and what is honest. ...more

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Jun 19, 2016 Bela Darcy rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Reseña completa aquí: http://leerenlaluna.blogspot.com.es/2...

Lo tiene todo: amor, guerra, venganza, inspiración. El autor escribe de maravilla y utiliza referencias que demuestran su cultura.
Son dos tramas que están enlazadas entre sí y se van combinando a lo largo del libro.
Lo recomiendo abiertamente.

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Jan 06, 2016 Freda Witt rated it did not like it

I only gave it a one star because it doesn't have a no star. This was supposed to be heartwarming? This is nothing heartwarming about it. There are no likable characters, no story line that I could see.

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Sep 02, 2014 Ivan rated it it was amazing

Hard not to spoil this book, so if you ask me, I'm just going to respond by asking why you haven't read it already. It's truly senseless not to.

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Aug 29, 2016 Daniel Weaver rated it liked it

Didn't pull me in

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Jun 10, 2018 A Reader's Heaven rated it liked it

Shelves: historical, mystery, net-galley, thrillers, war

(I received a free copy of this book from Net Galley in exchange for an honest review.)

Poxl West fled the Nazis’ onslaught in Czechoslovakia. He escaped their clutches again in Holland. He pulled Londoners from the Blitz’s rubble. He wooed intoxicating, unconventional beauties. He rained fire on Germany from his RAF bomber.
Poxl West is the epitome of manhood and something of an idol to his teenage nephew, Eli Goldstein, who reveres him as a brave, singular, Jewish war hero. Poxl fills Eli’s head (I received a free copy of this book from Net Galley in exchange for an honest review.)

Poxl West fled the Nazis’ onslaught in Czechoslovakia. He escaped their clutches again in Holland. He pulled Londoners from the Blitz’s rubble. He wooed intoxicating, unconventional beauties. He rained fire on Germany from his RAF bomber.
Poxl West is the epitome of manhood and something of an idol to his teenage nephew, Eli Goldstein, who reveres him as a brave, singular, Jewish war hero. Poxl fills Eli’s head with electric accounts of his derring-do, adventures and romances, as he collects the best episodes from his storied life into a memoir.
He publishes that memoir, Skylock, to great acclaim, and its success takes him on the road, and out of Eli’s life. With his uncle gone, Eli throws himself into reading his opus and becomes fixated on all things Poxl.
But as he delves deeper into Poxl’s history, Eli begins to see that the life of the fearless superman he’s adored has been much darker than he let on, and filled with unimaginable loss from which he may have not recovered. As the truth about Poxl emerges, it forces Eli to face irreconcilable facts about the war he’s romanticized and the vision of the man he's held so dear.

This is a book-within-a-book. An interesting approach to telling this story but one that worked...for the most part. A bestselling memoir, a proud nephew, and a missing uncle...

The hero of this story, if you will, is Poxl West, Jewish air bomber during WW2. He writes a memoir in his later years, which he dedicates to his young nephew, Eli. With the success of the memoir, Poxl heads out on tour and leaves Eli to come to terms with the incidents that are recounted in the memoir - not things that Eli loved his uncle for.

Unfortunately for me, I found the first 100 pages or so to be quite tedious. Once I engaged with the dual narratives, I quite enjoyed it. However, less of the memoir and more of Eli would have been a far different book - and one I would have preferred to read. I just think the memoir was just too much and really dragged the pacing of the story down.

I would, however, happily recommend this book as it takes a tired idea (stories of World War 2) and threw a new spin on it and, for that alone, I think this should be at least looked at!

Paul
ARH ...more

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Jun 08, 2017 Shelley Sherman rated it liked it

this was an interesting and well written book about a close family friend, a Jew from Czechoslavakia writing his memoir of his experience as a pilot with the RAF during WWII. the book alternates between the manuscript of the memoir and the realtionship of the young boy who views Poxl as a surrogate grandfather.
The memoir (book within a book) tells a touching story as does the alternating chapters. Still i sometimes found the book dragged and especially in the first third.
I would recommend it an ...more

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Apr 16, 2018 Robin Kempf rated it liked it

This is a book about a book. The narrative of The Last Flight of Poxl West alternates between (1) a young man‘s account of his relationship with a book called Skylock and its author Poxl West, and (2) excerpts of Skylock itself, a tale of Poxl West’s experiences in WW II. I myself preferred the sections of Skylock to the young man’s impressions. Nevertheless, as a whole, the author movingly explores how loss and trauma affects not only the person who experiences it but those close to him or her.

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Jun 12, 2018 Barbara Rhine rated it it was ok

I dunno. I just couldn't finish this. About a hundred pages in, the writing still seemed clunky and I had not developed much interest in either of the main characters or the situation. Still, I attended my synagogue book group's discussion of Torday's book. Some folks shared my reaction; others didn't. In any event, the conversation was sufficiently complex that I was sorta sorry that I didn't perservere. Not sorry enough to pick it up again, though...

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Jun 16, 2018 Veronica Spaeth rated it really liked it

I picked up this book because the author worked at my college. I didn’t know what to expect. It was really well written and the story was engaging and moving.

There are really two connected stories being told and the resolutions for both of them aren’t satisfying in a very intentional way. They’re not neat and tidy stories but they’re not supposed to be. I would definitely suggest the book. It’s worth a read.

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Nov 05, 2017 Alan rated it really liked it

Fictional account of a Czeck Jew who was sent initially to the Netherlands and eventually arrived in London. He puts his experience as a pilot to use as a pilot for his adopted country raining bombs on the Germans who killed his family. According to the book he wrote, telling the story to his adopted nephew over ice cream after visits to the symphony or art gallery, he wanted to revenge himself on the Germans. But that might not be the entire story.

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Oct 04, 2017 Carole rated it really liked it

Shelves: books-read-in-2017

Daniel Torday uses a classic story-within-a-story structure to explore the fascinating character of Poxl West and the nephew who hero worships him as a Jewish fighter pilot in The RAF during World War II.

How Poxl fled to England as a young Czech refugee just before the war started is fictional but authentically reflective of the real stories of many young people of the time. I really enjoyed reading his story but did think that the "big reveal" was not really much of a surprise.

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Oct 12, 2017 Joanie Driemeyer rated it it was ok

I slogged through this book. The format was unique and I wanted to like it, but I just couldn't get wrapped up in the story or the characters. There were some parts where the action picked up and I became engaged. But then Poxl would wax philosophical and I would need to reread the paragraph several times. Just ok.

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Nov 28, 2016 Rachel rated it liked it

A bit disappointing. The twist was predictable. It short, and overall enjoyable as a reading experience, but not as deep as I had hoped. If you're looking for a sort of coming of age story set during WWII, this might be good for you, but don't expect to be wowed.

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About Daniel Torday

Daniel Torday

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Daniel Torday is a two-time National Jewish Book Book Award recipient and winner of the 2017 Sami Rohr Choice Award for THE LAST FLIGHT OF POXL WEST. Torday's work has appeared in Conjunctions, The New York Times, Paris Review Daily, Tin House, and on NPR, and has been honored in both the Best American Short Stories and Best American Essays series. He is the Director of Creative Writing at Bryn Ma ...more

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“We might be able to see God's body in the Kabbalah's ten Sefirot, but it was 1986, barely forty years since our grandparents' generation sat desperate and fated in their East European neighborhoods. Never again, our teachers incanted to us Monday after Monday, Wednesday after Wednesday. But when I picture myself in those rooms in the basement of our shul, even now I can only hear the incantation's reciprocal: It will happen again. Beware. Be always aware.” — 1 likes

“At times, always unexpected, the flames of the past will come and burn a hole in my day.” — 1 likes

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