An interesting split on the new Richard Ford book, The Lay of the Land. LA Times book review editor David Ulin can’t make up his mind about it, while the NY Times loves it to pieces, with author interviews (written and podcast) on top of the glowing review. Canada’s Globe & Mail agrees, lauding the book as a “bravura performance” (via).
Yet something in the NY Times’ review, which is by fine film critic AO Scott, struck me:
those of us less modest than [Ford’s protagonist] Frank fall into the habit of proclaiming him a Representative Man, an Everyday Hero, a shining exemplar of the Great American Average. Inevitably, our mental Google Maps of American fiction click over from New Jersey into Pennsylvania, home of Rabbit Angstrom, another celebrated literary apotheosis of the regular guy.
Um, inevitably? Perhaps Updike is emblazoned upon the mental googlemaps of NY Times staffers in ultra-large font or something.
Did you read Michiko Kakatuni of NYT’s review of Lay of the Land? I think it is the most honest I’ve read about the book.