Second Generation

In THE IMMIGRANTS, Howard Fast began the story of the Lavettes, focusing on Dan and his wife, Jean. This second volume concentrates on their daughter, Barbara, and what adventures she has! From 1930s labor strife, to pre-WWII Paris to Calcutta to San Francisco, there is very little that doesn't make its way into Barbara Lavette's experience. Howard Fast writes in a way that keeps one turning the pages. When you feel you've heard enough from one character, he focuses on someone else for a while. There is a vast tapestry of characters here, some of whom are only introduced with an eye toward their greater importance in later volumes of the series. Barbara is an amazing, interesting character, and I loved her immensely. I also came to admire Jean (a character I almost loathed in THE IMMIGRANTS) due to her steadily maturing nature in this second episode. The sequence focusing on the D-Day landings at Normandy was excellently written and extremely exciting. It's very difficult to write about a battle without it being either overly dramatic or excruciatingly dull. Fast walks a very fine line here, brilliantly. He also mines his own experiences as a liberal, Jewish artist in the War years in order to provide anecdotes that drive the narrative. I can't wait to see what he does with the McCarthy era and HUAC in book number three, THE ESTABLISHMENT.