“I gave them all the truth and none of the honesty.”

McCamm cropped

How much honesty do you want from a novel? I’m at a point now where I am bored by action (isn’t that what TV is for?) and instead look for books that uncover surprising revelations. This one  does that.  McCann goes for the artery with an astonishing number of protagonists — twelve — and shows us their dark sides as well as their moments of grace.  It’s one thing to truthfully report what happens, and it’s another to dig deeper to provide an honest context for the situation.  That’s what happens here, and it’s why I love this book.

Colum McCann, Let the Great World Spin (New York: Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2010), 303.



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