Tag: Counterpoint

Canterbury Chronicles: “Mercy” by Joan Silber

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Working through the morass of new fiction can be just that. The established names come and go—Pynchon, McEwan—perhaps not talking of Michelangelo, but somehow commodified, even when the authors are assiduously avoiding it. All the more reason to appreciate the subtleties of Joan Silber’s work. Her latest novel, Mercy (Counterpoint; 256 pages), manages to be at once a street-smart account of the perils of shooting heroin as a party game among East Village friends and a Canterbury Tales of a carefully constructed set of characters whose paths cross in seemingly coincidental (but non-Dickensian) ways. The connections depicted, and their consequences, […]

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Blind Faith in the Power of Beauty: ‘The Prize’ by Jill Bialosky

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For Edward Darby, the meaning of life can be found in the curve of a well-crafted watch, in an antique table’s warm weight, or in the balancing stroke of paint on a chaotic canvas. The protagonist of Jill Bialosky’s new novel, The Prize (Counterpoint; 325 pages), lives his life according to the principle of cultivating beautiful things. Edward believes structure, attention to detail, and erudite emotion will bring him happiness. He looks to art to reveal the importance of ordinary life, but also as a means to transcend it. Over the course of the novel, the lacquer of Edward’s curated […]

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