About FDU Press

In The Rule of Time (CH, Oct'99), York (European literature, Univ. of Ulster) looked at certain English novels that were driven by what Henry James called the "strange irregular rhythm of life." In this book, again prodigiously researched and related in the curiously charming lecture mode of the previous work, the author presents ten essays, each one on 20th-century American novel, e.g., Saul Bellow's Mr. Sammler's Planet, John Barth's Giles Goat-Boy, Barbara Kingsolver's The Poisonwood Bible. Working to discover the truth of each novel in "the energy of the author," York intends his message to reach readers who enjoy fiction and want to appreciate more how fiction's invention "contributes to [the] understanding of the real world outside the pages of the book or the head of the writer." The introduction contains a precisely honed review of the development of narratology, beginning with Henry James and continuing with major points about the use of point of view and American novelists' habit of impoisng their fictional world on the reader. The book operates with pervading literary intelligence, distilled yet detailed, lucid yet demanding, and will be useful to those who find the study of technique a fruitful approach to better readings of novels. Summing up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates and above.