Michiko Kakutani in the New York Times really didn't much like Jonathan Lethem's new book, Chronic City. I loved Lethem's Fortress of Solitude (and so did Kakutani), Lethem's opus about growing up in Brooklyn in the 1970's. So I have every intention of reading Chronic City even if it is about Manhattan. First I have to finish Middlemarch and Big Machine by Victor LaValle.
…Mr. Lethem’s Chronic City seems like an insipid, cartoon
version of Manhattan: recognizable in outline (with snooty Upper East
Side dinner parties, a wealthy businessman turned mayor and all manner
of eccentric artists and has-beens, socialites and socialists), but
garnished with odd details (snow in the summertime, a tiger roaming the
streets, an apartment building for dogs) that feel more like whimsical
embroiderings than genuinely interesting or illuminating inventions
version of Manhattan: recognizable in outline (with snooty Upper East
Side dinner parties, a wealthy businessman turned mayor and all manner
of eccentric artists and has-beens, socialites and socialists), but
garnished with odd details (snow in the summertime, a tiger roaming the
streets, an apartment building for dogs) that feel more like whimsical
embroiderings than genuinely interesting or illuminating inventions