Palladio

I loved this book. It is beautifully written - I was hooked from the first page. Dee is a masterful storyteller. It is so refreshing to read a novel that takes the reader in unexpected directions. Dee creates compelling characters while examining the relationship between art and advertising. I enjoyed every page of this fantastic novel. Dee weaves his story together so seemlessly that he makes writing look easy.

This is everything a novel should be. Although at first glance the subject and characters were far from my usual interests, I was pulled into it and rapidly became entranced by it. It has many dimensions, is flawlessly written and structured, and transforms you. In some respects it is an extended meditation on Jack Kerouac's On The Road, which is central to the theme, but it is hard to characterize the whole book as it is bigger than any simplistic summary. The author understands Madison Avenue, the enigmatic rich, thirty-something bright but warped people, and much more and is able to make them come alive. In many ways this is a sad book. There are five sets of parent/child relationships at all stages of life, from infancy to the death or disintegration of parents in old age, explored in some depth, all different, all seriously flawed and at times heartbreaking. The author needs to break away from the lingering university scene (too much of the book is set at Berkeley, NYU, Columbia, Spokane, and Charlottesville) but this is not irritating as he gently deflates the pomposities of each place and all feel different in his descriptions.May Dee live a thousand years and write a thousand books every year. Buy it at once; you will not be disappointed.