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Far Afield
By Blake de Pastino
NOVEMBER 9, 1998:
A World Away
Stewart O'Nan (Henry Holt, cloth, $23)
Writing instructors are always telling their charges to "write
what you know," advice that most of today's young writers
have lived like gospel. More and more authors these days are tweaking
that line between fiction and autobiography, creativity and self-indulgence,
as they churn out growing numbers of novels about, well, themselves.
They are books by thirtysomething New Yorkers about thirtysomething
New Yorkers, novels by brunette waitresses about brunette waitresses.
And more often than not, their main characters are young, frustrated
writers. With famous navel-gazers like Jay McInerney and Bret
Easton Ellis at the helm, the new generation of novelists has
turned to its own reflection for meaning, and really there's nothing
wrong with that. But it doesn't have to be that way.
Stewart O'Nan is one of the few writers his age who has searched
far afield for inspiration. His first novel from 1994, Snow
Angels, focused on gruesome dramas in the American hinterland.
His Names of the Dead was a powerful rendering of a Vietnam
vet--so knowledgeable and sympathetic, in fact, that it won acclaim
from veterans' groups. And in last year's gritty, sensational
The Speed Queen, O'Nan took on the voice of a woman on
death row. Rarely since the days of Arthur Miller and J. D. Salinger
has an author taken such pains to make himself invisible in his
work, to write about experiences not his own. Some would argue
that it's fiction in its purest form.
In his latest release, A World Away, O'Nan explores yet
another swath of unfamiliar territory for a writer of his generation--World
War II. And in many respects, the distance between the author
and his subject is what marks the novel, both for good and for
bad. In essence, it's an excellent lesson in the challenges of
writing "real fiction."
The year is 1943. The place, a beachfront village in upstate New
York. This is where we meet the Langer family, a wartime household
that's groping for its own sense of security. There's James, the
adulterous husband; Anne, the spiteful wife; Jay, on the brink
of puberty and plagued by nightmares, and Rennie, the elder son
who has been shipped off to the Pacific, his teenage bride tumid
with pregnancy. Together, this shrapnel of a family shares close
quarters in the house of James' ailing father, and it's not long
before they begin to studiously avoid each other. Theirs is a
story of disconnection--missed chances and unspoken emotions--told
with an omniscient voice that probes each character one chapter
at a time.
It's the quality of that voice--its sympathy and authority--that
really gives A World Away its greatest strength. O'Nan
is a master at painting elaborate scenes with just a few words--rich
with details and telling human moments--and his skills are put
to good use here. Off the coast of Alaska, for example, Rennie
and other grunts are waiting for battle: "a horn shook the
air, and everyone laughed at their terror." Back home, "the
river ran black in spring, the thaw piling ice on the banks like
smashed china." On every page you can find a well-turned
phrase or glimpsing insight. And then there's the historical ambiance.
DeSotos tool the streets of town. Bogart stars in Sahara
at the cinema. A Philco buzzes in the living room, bringing news
of war.
Few writers can craft a scene as rich as O'Nan, true enough, so
maybe it's ironic that this same richness is also what hobbles
his latest novel. There's only a thin thread of a plot here--a
backstory about James and Anne's infidelities, followed by Rennie's
traumatic return from war--but even that is subsumed by pages
of pitch-thick atmosphere. Basically, A World Away is so
sonorous a period piece that it struggles to rise above the level
of melodrama. The characters find themselves competing with the
setting.
But still, O'Nan is a writer of such resplendent talent that his
overindulgences are easy to forgive. If anything, we could use
more young novelists who are as interested in creating fiction,
and fewer who only want to parse over their own tiny lives. (It's
no coincidence, for instance, that both McInerney and Ellis are
coming out with books about famous young people this season.)
A full four novels into his career, O'Nan is poised to become
America's best young novelist. All he needs to do is share a little
bit more of "what he knows," in addition to what he
has researched.

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