It's rare that a reviewer gets to make amends, but last year I wrote a very short review of The Yiddish Policeman's Union, and I'd like to belatedly correct something. Because of space issues, I cut the review in half at the last minute,
leaving the wrong impression. It was dumb. The blurb read:
Kavalier & Clay fans will delight in the alternate universe of this novel, in which Jews flee fascism to Alaska. But the narrow, Raymond Chandler-esque plot may disappoint.
As a matter of fact, I loved the hard-boiled, Chandler-esque plot. I was only trying to advise a certain kind of Wired reader, the kind who loved Kavalier and Clay for it's comic-book milieu, not to expect the same kind of geeky satisfactions. That's called over-thinking. In the original review, I went on to describe the novel's jewel-like form and extraordinary originality, but we trimmed that out.
So let me say it here: Chabon is a genius, and Yiddish Policeman's Union is a classic. The paperback edition just hit stores . . . without a glowing blurb from Wired. Sorry about that.
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