(no subject)

[skygiants]

I really, really enjoyed Glen David Gold's Carter Beats the Devil, and it's hard for me to explain exactly why.

I mean, at its heart, it turns out Carter Beats the Devil is a Man Full of Manpain About Dead Wife Learns to Live Again kind of book, which is usually the kind of book I vehemently avoid. It helps that in this case the depressed man is a 1920s stage magician, and the process of Learning to Live Again features EPIC STAGE MAGICIAN RIVALRIES! and DEATH-DEFYING STUNTS! and BURNED-OUT FBI AGENTS! and MYSTERIOUS PRESIDENTIAL DEATHS! and an ADORABLE PET LION! and the INVENTION OF TELEVISION! (which is especially hilarious to me, because here I am bopping along, happily immersed in this 1920's novel, and all of a sudden Philo Farnsworth and the cathode ray tube technology that I am supposed to be learning about for at least two of my classes next year rear up and bites me in the face.)

And I love 1920s California, and twisty stage magicians, and gloriously melodramatic plots -- of which this was certainly one -- so all this was more than enough to keep me occupied, but also to my surprise I found myself really liking Carter, which I did not as much expect. It is a rare instance in which epic manpain does not accompany epic jerkitude! So even though I would have traded Carter for his awesome dead wife in a heartbeat (she is SO GREAT in flashbacks! She's an ex-pianist who decided she would rather PUNCH PEOPLE IN THE FACE. I loved her and hated that she was dead by backstory) and even though I am really pretty unhappy about the novel's repeated motif of "your wife died/was injured for YOUR dreams! DON'T YOU FEEL BAD NOW," I found that I was having enough fun that I was totally willing to suspend any and all judgyfaces until the end of the book.

(I also like that as far as the supporting characters go, it's not a world that defaults to able cis straight white male. And that shouldn't be a thing worth noting, but in historical novels, it often really is is. So I appreciate that, too.)

And, man, I don't know, guys. It's one of those books where the plot doesn't actually make that much sense if you squint at it, but it's all strung together with really, really good set pieces, and somewhere in between the random extraneous pirates and the bootlegger posing as a rabbi to sell sacramental wine and Carter accidentally escaping from rogue FBI agents due to his utter glee about his new motorcycle, I found myself sold.

Comments

[tree_and_leaf]

I think it's definitely a book where the parts are greater than the sum - but the parts are so great, mostly, that it doesn't matter.

[skygiants]

Hah, yes, that's exactly it. It's just really consistently entertaining! Even if the things that are entertaining are often not at all the same from one scene to the next.

[agonistes]

I think -- and I have FEELINGS about this book, so, you know, fair warning -- what sold me on it is that the (admittedly obnoxious) repeated motif of "FEEL AWFUL ABOUT YOUR WIFE'S DEATH" eventually morphed into Carter having to make the deliberate decision to pull himself out of his own self-absorbed grief, and then having to make the decision to stick with it, only to find that everybody's been there waiting for him all along.

And that same everybody keeps pointing out how ridiculous it is that he's this way. I mean, yeah, it's a manpain kind of novel? But the self-indulgence of it isn't the Tortured Male Artist part, it's the Bootlegger Rabbi And New Motorcycle And The Walking The Lion After Dark part. Gold's on Carter's side, sure, but I think Gold also makes it clear that being on Carter's side involves a certain level of wanting him to get over himself already.

~~~~THE DEVIL ISN'T THE DEVIL, IT'S YOUR OWN PERSONAL DEMONS AND YOU ARE YOUR OWN ESCAPE ARTIST~~~~ and tl;dr I'm just a sucker for that kind of book.

Relatedly: I find it FASCINATING that this book and The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay came out around the same time. FASCINATING. And I think I might actually prefer Carter Beats The Devil.

[sdelmonte]

Funny that I never thought about the similarities between the books. It does seem utterly obvious now.

[skygiants]

I think the only thing that really ended up bothering me, gender-wise, was the part where Philo Farnsworth's wife also gets horribly injured in a freak cathode ray tube-related accident. Because at that point, it stopped seeming like the plot of this particular book, and more like a pattern that I wasn't happy about.

That being said, I totally agree with everything else -- especially where the self-indulgence is, and I am all for that kind of self-indulgence. Why not walk your lion after dark! WHY NOT.

Also -- man, I didn't realize that they came out so close together. That is fascinating. I also think I might like Carter Beats the Devil better, but it's been seven or eight years since I read Kavalier and Clay . . . so perhaps it is about time for a comparison reread!