Chronic City: A Novel

Jonathan Lethem

Oct 2009 · Sold by Vintage

About this ebook

A New York Times Book Review Best Book of the Year.

A searing and wildly entertaining love letter to New York City from the bestselling author of Motherless Brooklyn and Fortress of Solitude. 
 
Chase Insteadman, former child television star, has a new role in life—permanent guest on the Upper East Side dinner party circuit, where he is consigned to talk about his astronaut fiancée, Janice Trumbull, who is trapped on a circling Space Station. A chance encounter collides Chase with Perkus Tooth, a wily pop culture guru with a vicious conspiratorial streak and the best marijuana in town. Despite their disparate backgrounds and trajectories Chase and Perkus discover they have a lot in common, including a cast of friends from all walks of life in Manhattan.  Together and separately they attempt to define the indefinable, and enter into a quest for the most elusive of things: truth and authenticity in a city where everything has a price. 

"Full of dark humor and dazzling writing" --Entertainment Weekly  

Ratings and reviews

The problem with Chronic City, which is well-written and relatively engaging, is the narrator, Chase. He's supposed to be a vacuous pretty boy, but his narration is the opposite of that -- it's observant and deep and relatively full of references and allusions. I assume Chase's narrator voice is Lethem's, but the character whose thoughts those are supposed to be doesn't sync up with the thoughts -- the narration, which is basically the book, is not believable in that sense, and that level of unbelievability was a lingering problem, at least for me. Also, the parts that Chase does not narrate have an uncomfortable fit in the whole -- there is a narrator (Chase) and, once in a while, when Lethem needs things to happen that Chase doesn't know about, a ghost narration in approximately the same voice. Overall, I thought the book was good, but not great, and, I have to admit, in the wake of the pr and the surprisingly adoring mainstream reviews, a bit of a disappointment. Back to Roberto Bolano for me!

Lethem exhibits a mastery of story-telling in 'Chronic City.' The layers of questions and references are never what they seem. Lethem schools you in taking things at face value if you give him your time and attention. You will begin to question everything about the world you know.

About the author

JONATHAN LETHEM is the author of seven novels. A recipient of the MacArthur Fellowship, Lethem has also published his stories and essays in The New Yorker, Harper's, Rolling Stone, Esquire, and the New York Times, among others.