T. Coraghessan Boyle

Im Rahmen eines einzigartigen Experiments nimmt das Wissenschaftlerehepaar Schemerhorn das Schimpansenbaby Sam bei sich auf, um es wie ein Kind zu erziehen. Es lernt die (Gebärden-)Sprache, Essen, Trinken, auf Toilette gehen. Doch als seine engste Bezugsperson verschwindet, zerbricht die Illusion eines menschgewordenen Affen: Sam, zwei Jahre, tobt und rast. Erst mit dem Auftauchen der Studentin Aimée kehrt wieder Frieden ein und zwischen den Beiden entsteht eine ganz besondere Beziehung. show more Doch leider ist dies nicht von Dauer.
Obwohl Sam durch Fernsehauftritte einen gewissen Bekanntheitsgrad erlangt und seine Fähigkeiten zweifelsfrei anerkannt werden, wird die finanzielle Unterstützung dieses Experiments beendet. Sam muss in eine Art Forschungslabor, in einen Käfig, gefangen, gemeinsam mit anderen Affen. Doch Aimée will das nicht akzeptieren.

Die Guten und Bösen sind fast schon ein bisschen klischeehaft dargestellt: Der böse Professor mit schwarzer Augenklappe, der seine Affen ausschließlich als Dinge betrachtet, ob sie nun sprechen können oder nicht. Die herzensgute Aimée, die bis zur Selbstaufopferung liebt. Und der Wissenschaftler Schemerhorn, der deutlich diffuser dargestellt wird, obwohl dennoch schnell klar ist, in welche Richtung sein Handeln gehen wird.

Trotzdem ist T.C. Boyle in diesem Buch ein wirkliches Kunststück gelungen wie ich finde. Er lässt die Geschichte aus unterschiedlichen Perspektiven erzählen, auch aus der Sams. Statt diesen aber zu vermenschlichen, in dem er ihm einen ’normalen‘ Tonfall verleiht, sind es seine bruchstückhaften Gedanken, die durch die großgeschriebenen Worte (die, die Sam in der Gebärdensprache kennt und versteht) bestimmt werden. So wirken diese vergleichsweise kurzen Abschnitte überaus glaubhaft.

Ich habe Sam in diesem Buch ins Herz geschlossen und konnte Aimées Handeln in Bezug auf ihn voll und ganz nachvollziehen (anderes hingegen nicht), was mich auch seitdem öfter über die Beziehung Mensch – Tier nachdenken lässt. Ein lesenswertes Buch! show less

Having divorced two self-involved would-be artistes, I'm sympathetic to the draw that Frank Lloyd Wright had for the intelligent women who found themselves in his orbit. Unlike them however, FLW had true genius and vision combined with the skill and drive to make his dreams a reality. The story of the women in Wright's life is told in reverse chronological order by an acolyte of his later years, Tadashi Sato. Sato is a Harvard educated Japanese national who's outsider observations about show more Wright and the American milieu are particularly pithy. He starts with the story of Wright's last wife, the one he knew, and relates the history of the previous women: Wright's drug crazed second wife, the savagely murdered mistress and the long suffering first wife who was mother of most of his children. In between he relates Wright's career successes, his financial failures and the trauma of the burning of his home Taliesin twice. If modern day celebrities have problems with paparazzi, they have nothing on the newspapermen who hounded Wright and his women. If true genius has a fatal flaw in Wright's case it was The Women. show less

I wasn't expecting to have a multiple POV device, but it worked well for a couple of reasons. First is that Terry is pretty much a blank. He just works and observes humanity through the ailments or conditions they present. He has no color or much in the way of personality and his life is as empty as his apartment. I can't see why he wanted to be a doctor...there is no interiority that explains it and he doesn't seem to like it much. No wonder Bethany (aside from the T&A) hits him like a bolt show more from the blue. She is the only thing that becomes interesting about him. In some ways it's hard to watch him being played, for played is what it must be. Why else hang around with him? The occasional biting quip is nice, but is it enough? He must have a magic dick. While she is a manipulative, duplicitous jerk a lot of the time, there is a bit down deep that realizes that she is basically a jerk and questions the long-term benefits of that. Oh she says she loves him towards the end, but who would believe her? I don't think she does herself, but only convinces herself that she does. Jesse's parts take the unlikeability a step further - his mind and life are basically a cesspool and he's a useless waste of air. That kind of inability to deal at all with emotions that don't prop up his ego or feel good is what's destroying men of the modern age. What is with it with these assholes? If the universe doesn't spit out sunshine and puppies for them all the time, they turn into raging psychos. I was hoping Terry would leave him to die, but alas he doesn't and Jesse will continue on to ruin other lives like poor Daisy. She's the only one I felt any sympathy towards at all and is clearly the most sensible of the bunch. They don't' deserve her. show less

Historical fiction is rarely this flawless, but many T. C. Boyle fans may find San Miguel a jarring departure from Boyle's usual rock-and-roll black humor. I've loved the dark and wicked wit of Boyle's works, but everything I love best about Boyle is here. A chilling mastery of narrative distance, the omnipresent battle with nature red in tooth and claw, the harsh death of the Utopian dream, and characterization so all-consuming that I felt I had to tear myself loose from each central female show more character (Maranatha, Edith, and Elise) in turn.

I've often wondered what fictional magic would occur if Boyle expanded his inimitable short stories into novellas, giving the rich characterization a chance to really take hold. This novel is really a triptych of fully realized novellas, all sharing the same setting and one minor character. The reader faces the Boylean dilemma yet again. With everything rigged against us, including nature itself and our own human aspirations and limitations, how do people survive and achieve the good life? If we had reached the good life, would we even realize it? show less