childhood’s refugees: Goodbye Lenin!

A hilariously touching coming-of-age story, Goodbye Lenin! not only places the protagonists at a contemporary transitional threshold of very late teens/early twenties but also defines modern adulthood as taking control of the lie you live. Germany’s unification is shown as something driven by youth who first fear an empty adulthood perpetually waiting for poor-quality necessities but [...]

hope and shovels

US! Chris Bachelder 2006 Early in Chris Bachelder’s latest novel, US!, the often-resurrected Upton Sinclair tells his reluctant secretary-cum-protector of an early job writing for the funny pages: “I will tell you the secret of joke writing,” he said. “Jokes are made up hind end forward, so to speak.” Beginning with a subject—the great Socialist [...]