"The Golden House" by Salmon Rushdie - Review

"The alphabet is where all our secrets begin."

It's sentences like that that cause readers to jeer Salmon Rushdie's new book "The Golden House".

It's also sentences like that that make it great because it is undeniably true.

This is the story of a rich  immigrant family that tries to bury its dark past in bright American dreams. Classical  history and literature about power, family and tragedy and current events about  power, family and tragedy echo and crash into each other in this story. The title itself harkens back to Nero's Domus Aurea in all its splendor and ruin. All its splendor and ruin. It examines the eternal struggle  between identity and fate.

The novel's structure is complex. The family's backstory is told not in flashbacks, but rather in a series of nesting stories. Each time the story goes back in time,  we get a smaller and more precise framing of the family's past and each time we go forward we get a bigger flash forward of its tragic future. (Similar to the way "This is Us" tells its story.) This is a remarkable feat of storytelling.

This novel is also a coming of age story and also a New York story and also a political story and also a crime story. This review has barely scratched the surface. You may hear that it is "too much".  You may also hear that there is too much surface and no depth. But I recommend it if you're ready for a book where the mythical Baba Yaga inside a conniving woman complains of flying commercial the way she does broomsticks; where a man refrains from suicide to avoid messing up the carpet; where the grand scope of an act of  terrorism meets its match in the depth of a domestic tale of infidelity and maternal honor; where both Donald Trump and Barack Obama make an entrance.

Yep, it's that crazy of  a crazy ride.

"Br’er Cotton" - Review

"Br'er Cotton"  While watching this I was pretty sure that I was listening to the voice of a new master: Tearrance Chisholm. It's a play about a young black man grappling with the violence and hate in "his" society. Though this is, sadly, common fare right now, the writing and production are anything but. Through a sure voice and stunning visuals we see the human response to a static oppressive environment that cannot be escaped - not through time, not through work, not through avoidance, not through prayer.  Lunches, school, play, work - everything is disrupted. That disruption is much more felt by the young who are still being told how life is supposed to be.

The writing (with one or two questionable choices that I can't mention without spoiling) is superb - precise without being cold or sharp; layered without relying on symbolism. It touches on references to literature and folk tale. When the beauty and the talent is in the text, the other artists' contributions rise to that level.  It's no coincidence that good films and books have good key art and covers.  Same here. The production design is inspired and the singing is just right, just enough. Even the program art is evocative and artful. The acting is strong. The ending is challenging. It's one of those where you can see it from two perspectives, but you will probably have an opinion.

 See it. Google Chisholm. Let's talk!