Exploring American culture through literature : Let The Great World Spin by Colum McCann

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I've just finished reading the second book on my pre-USA reading reading list:  Let The Great World Spin by Colum McCann.  This one is a little different in that it's a relatively recently written book, published in 2009, and McCann is an Irishman currently living in New York.

The first thing that really struck me about this book is it's portrayal of New York being a living, breathing entity.  The city is described with such precision and life, it really reminded me of A New York Winter's Tale.  New York, it seems, can either be a beautiful creature, presenting its inhabitant's with countless opportunities and pleasures, or a beast that can eat you up, suck out your soul and then spit you back out, and even though it treats you like this, you still  belong to the city and the city belongs to you.   

The novel is set in post-Vietnam, mid 1970s, just after the construction of the Twin Towers.  The World Trade Center acts as a kind of focal point which joins together all the stories and lives of the characters.  The Twin Towers unite people from all creeds, colours and backgrounds, and it seems extra poignant to me that we found ourselves in similar situation only forty years later.  

Let The Great World spin is a multi-layered portrait of life in this area and as I said, overlays and weaves together the lives of very different people, from the a judge and his wife living in the Upper East Side, to prostitutes in the Bronx, ex-pats and more.  It really drives home the message that although these people are incredibly different, they all live through the same fundamentals in life: they love, they grieve, they make bad decisions.    

I really enjoyed this book: it was challenging without being hardwork; it was beautiful, yet gritty and real; it gave a honest insight into a city that struggles to be contained onto pages.  The protagonists came to life in their own chapters, some more likable than others, but all genuine and believable.  There are no less than eleven main characters in this story and it seems like a feat to drive the story forward when you are creating so many in-depth and three dimensional characters.  This book has made quite an impression on me and I'm sure that if I ever get the opportunity to visit New York, I will think more about its complexity and facets as it continues to grow and evolve.

Next on my list is John Steinbeck's East of Eden.