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What Members Thought
“There’s a plot afoot alright, and I’ll gladly name the forces propelling it - hysteria, ignorance, malice, stupidity, hatred, fear. What a repugnant spectacle our country has become. Falsehood, cruelty and madness everywhere.”
Puede que el argumento no me interese demasiado.
I can't imagine why Roth would take on the task of researching this dense novel if he didn't think another Holocaust were plausible, and I'm inclined to agree.
He plays himself (Jewish, with a lower-middle class upbringing) as a nine-year-old boy witnessing and living an alternate history of America.
The whole thing's too believable for comfort. It's thick with real and imagined facts from the time surrounding WW2, and the truths and fictions are meshed effortlessly in the author's stylized, flui ...more
He plays himself (Jewish, with a lower-middle class upbringing) as a nine-year-old boy witnessing and living an alternate history of America.
The whole thing's too believable for comfort. It's thick with real and imagined facts from the time surrounding WW2, and the truths and fictions are meshed effortlessly in the author's stylized, flui ...more
Fast-paced, charming, what-if type book. Roth is always playing with the "what-ifs" so it makes sense that he devotes the whole premise of a book to the ultimate what-if: America siding with Hitler during World War II.
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When this came out in 2005 many thought it a response to the Bush years. Re-reading it now, it seems to presciently foreshadow the rise of Trump in the GOP. It remains a scary, foreboding piece of alternative history. This is Roth's last "big" novel, and while not as pulsing with life as his very best, still very much worth reading.
In re-reading to prepare for teaching, this book seems more prophetic than ever. Still, could use some editing and some stretches could have been edited imho. ...more
In re-reading to prepare for teaching, this book seems more prophetic than ever. Still, could use some editing and some stretches could have been edited imho. ...more
Never before reading about politics was more interesting to me. I felt the pains and fears of the narrator, in the ups and downs of the narration's words, that were from time to time unreliable. After all he was just a kid experiencing a lot of things unknown to him.
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Amazing how timely this story is. Truly frightening...
Aug 12, 2012
Michael Kushner
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Amin
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May 30, 2013
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Jun 05, 2013
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Mar 13, 2016
Ben Lynch
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Alex Jones
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Dec 19, 2017
Nick Firth
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