Crossroads, the first instalment in a proposed trilogy called A Key to All Mythologies, is a big book that paints an intimate and compelling portrait of a family. In other words, it’s classic Franzen.
Jonathan Franzen (Photo by Janet Fine).
Firmly set in the 1970s, the novel follows the lives of members of the Hildebrandt family, whose patriarch Russ is a pastor at the local church. Russ’ marriage is in trouble, he’s disconnected from his children, he’s tempted by a member of the congregation, and he has a nemesis in the form of Rick Ambrose, leader of the church’s youth group, Crossroads. Several of Russ’ children attend Crossroads, which is a humiliating betrayal for him, but is seen quite differently from their perspectives.
This is a story about perspectives, as Russ’ wife Marion, and their children Perry, Becky and Clem are each the protagonists of their own parts of the story. Each of these characters is well-drawn and strong enough to be the basis of their own novels, and Franzen masterfully intertwines their stories in a big and vivid portrait of a family in crisis, and the way the individuals involved face the changing cultural landscape of the early 1970s.
Russ sees Marion in a completely different way to the way she sees herself and her relationship to her traumatic personal history, while their son Perry, already deeply involved with drugs at age 14, is clearly on a bad road. Each of their stories is engaging and compelling. While Clem and Becky’s chapters aren’t quite on the same level as the others, their stories round out a full picture of the Hildebrandt family and it’s fascinating to see where all their lives diverge and intersect.
There’s something that feels really fresh about Crossroads, despite the fact that it is walking the well-trodden path of long novels about unhappy families. The setting is really brought to life, as is the sense of humiliation that’s weaved through the novel. It sometimes verges on being contrived, but Franzen is always able to pull back and keep things grounded. It also helps that he’s just a great writer who has an innate talent for taking domestic and petty situations and turning them into great drama.
Crossroads is a great read, and makes me excited for what Franzen does next.
—Crossroads: A Key to All Mythologies by Jonathan Franzen (HarperCollins Australia) is out now.
Crossroads
It’s December 23, 1971, and heavy weather is forecast for Chicago.
Russ Hildebrandt, the associate pastor of a liberal suburban church, is on the brink of breaking free of a marriage he finds joyless – unless his wife, Marion, who has her own secret life, beats him to it. Their eldest child, Clem, is coming home from college on fire with moral absolutism, having taken an action that will shatter his father. Clem’s sister, Becky, long the social queen of her high-school class, has sharply veered into the counterculture, while their brilliant younger brother Perry...
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