Customer Reviews

The Age of Dreaming

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
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This is a well-written novel about the early days (through 1922, primarily) of Hollywood film-making. There are real characters in the novel (e.g. Chaplin, Pickford, etc), purely fictional characters, and characters who to degrees from about 5% to 95% are based on real people: it can be a little confusing sorting out what's real and what's fiction. The protagonist, Jun Nakayama, is tracked down by a silent film enthusiast. The novel shuttles back and forth thereafter between the present (1964) and the past (primarily about 1907-1922). There are elements of Sessue Hayakawa in Nakayama, but there are also major differences.

If you know a bit about silent film history, you can sniff out a major plot line early in the book. One of the people Nakayama speaks about is Nora Minton Niles, who will play a major role in Nakayama's life and the book. You might be able to realize that this is a fictionalized Mary Miles Minter, a young and popular star who is best remembered now for her role in the William Desmond Taylor murder case. I wasn't really happy about this--it seemed to telegraph too much of what might lay ahead. Why not use her real name, use an unrelated name such as Lola Lola, or, best of all perhaps, make up a plot element that is not a well-known part of Hollywood history.

So, later on, when Ashley Bennett Tyler enters the story, you know that this is intended to be William Desmond Taylor. The Mabel Normand equivalent(?) is rather more subtle. There are episodes in history which are hard to improve on if you try to present them as fiction. Keeping the names the same, retaining the facts, but describing thoughts and dialogue that were never set down or recorded makes for historical fiction. You can think of, say, the baseball work Eight Men Out about the Black Sox--good historical fiction based on fact. Then imagine a novel with the same facts, but with all names changed and the team is the Ruppert Mundys. Michener does this kind of thing in Centennial--not successfully, if you know a bit of Colorado history. So I would have much preferred to see real names and facts in the book, or else simply invent an interesting plot line.

The Nakayama-Niles-Tyler linkage forms a rather major part of the story, but there are other parts as well--the racism, the Hollywood life, the making of the silent films: these all make for an interesting novel. For some additional reading, Kirkpatrick's A Cast of Killers relates King Vidor's investigation of the Taylor murder: it's a very well-done piece of nonfiction, and there are photos on Minter, Taylor, etc. Also worthwhile is Mann's Biograph Girl: this is a novel based upon the real silent film actress Florence Lawrence. The actress, now 107 and in a nursing home, relates to some young people about her days in Hollywood, and some mysterious events that occurred, including her own supposed suicide in 1938. So--Age of Dreaming is a good novel for those who want a view of Hollywood in the silent film days.

"The Age of Dreaming" is a book for readers who want to immerse themselves in history and place. "The Age of Dreaming" is a book for readers who love to learn about a different culture. This is a book for readers who appreciate the nuances of language and the well-turned phrase.

"The Age of Dreaming" takes place in Los Angeles in the early twentieth century. The narrator, Jun Nakayama, looks back at his decision to withdraw from the world at large, but more precisely, the world of silent films after a surprisingly successful early career. His realizations about race relations, the meaning of love, and the need for family are revealed slowly and subtly with surprising twists and a murder mystery.

This is an elegant, satisfying novel from a talented writer. Ms. Revoyr treats both her subject and her readers with respect.

There's a quirky 1950's movie starring William Holden and Gloria Swanson that I've always been drawn to called Sunset Boulevard. What always fascinated me, other than Swanson's gloriously over-the-top performance, were the glimpses of the early days of movies and the larger than life escapades of the silent picture stars. That's probably one of the reasons that I first decided to read The Age of Dreaming by Nina Revoyr, since it is a novel about a silent picture star whose sex appeal and glamour kept pace with the likes of Rudolph Valentino and Douglas Fairbanks in their heydays.

But there's a difference. Jun Nakayama is Japanese, and for Japanese Americans, even those native born, California in the early 1920's was not a comfortable or even safe place to be. Despite Jun's fame and success in motion pictures, he encounters many overt and many more subtle forms of racial prejudice. His legions of adoring female fans seem to be drawn to him as to forbidden fruit. In his films, where Jun plays the Oriental villain, usually with evil designs on the innocent white maiden, his sexual attractiveness is the result of his "otherness"; since his amorous advances are forbidden by white society, they seem all the more exciting to his squealing admirers.

Jun is willing to accept the strictures of society on his public life, so long as he can make the huge sums of money his movie stardom engenders. He loves the craft of acting and seeks to perfect his art. He relishes the fame, fast cars, big houses, and bigger parties, pretending not to notice the frisson in the room should he ever appear to be too intimate with any of his white co-stars.

Reckless of the tension building around him and indifferent to the growing strife experienced by the Japanese community, Jun pretends that the rules can be bent and even broken by someone of his fame and acting calibre. When his world comes crashing down, he goes into hiding--and denial--for decades.

But as an old, reclusive man in the 1960's, he is approached by an eager young man who wants to write a film script about the silent film era, and wants the feature role to go Jun, who hasn't appeared in films for 40 years. At first Jun refuses to even consider the matter, but speaking to the young man stirs up memories and fears of a long forgotten murder investigation and threatens to bring to the surface many sordid and unexplained acts of violence Jun has tried to bury. With the past revived and breathing down his neck, Jun feels compelled to ferret out answers and locate any of his former friends and film associates who might help him get to the truth.

Told in a series of flashbacks that vividly recall the special time and place of Los Angeles in the early movie-making days, The Age of Dreaming is a wonderful melding of nostalgia and edginess. There's a mystery to solve and guilt to resolve, and along the way a lost love to understand and regret. Jun is a character worthy of our admiration and our exasperation, but above all, he and his story are unique and memorable.

Ms. Revoyr has given us a wonderful novel with "The Age of Dreaming". The story centers around Jun Nakayama, a young Japanese man, who becomes a famous silent film star in the early 1900's while in the United States. The story is presented to us during the 1960's as our main character has been asked to return to the screen (after a forty year absence) and he recounts some of the highlights of his career prior to being asked to take on his first speaking role. We not only are made aware of the racial inequities of the time, but we also learn about many of his friends who were also stars of the "silent era". The author gives us a wonderful historical perspective of Los Angeles as she discusses the film industry and its beginnings in the city of angels. Additionally, there is the murder of one of Jun's favorite directors from the past; and the story is kicked up a notch as Jun visits some of his "friends" from the "silent era" to see what they recall about the unsolved murder. Ultimately, Ms. Revoyr gives us a very satisfying ending to what I found to be a very poignant read. Highly recommended.

There are so many reasons to love this book it is hard to know where to begin.

Only a bilingual, bicultural writer could have pulled off a coup like this. With a story set in 1964, Revoyr artfully weaves the culturally complex past thoughts and actions of the main character into a wonderful setting and story. Her ability to slowly reveal the weaknesses of her main character keeps the reader in a near dream state, always wondering what new fact of the past or misconception of the intentions of others past and present, will reveal about this Asian male. In the end, Revoyr draws a picture that helps the reader discover the true interior voice of her main character and, if the reader is watching carefully, an honest inner dialogue that might take place in the mind of an Asian male who is constantly surrounded by strong women who both confuse, manipulate and humiliate him.

Revoyr's writing is artful. It was hard to keep in mind that one was reading fiction and not history. Although she acknowledges some "time frame" mistakes, they are too small to affect the story. Her research into the period was deep and her characters seem to fit flawlessly into the great backdrop of the "silent era."

If you like murder mysteries, but they aren't your favorite genre, you'll love the way Revoyr handles the murder mystery that hovers in the background of this story. It's like a wispy cobweb that you know hangs in the corner of the room, but there's no hurry to take it down. Like the spider still working on the greater web, Revoyr is weaving, weaving, weaving all the time to draw the reader in -- until she's ready to let you swat away the cobweb and see the corner clearly.

"The Age of Dreaming" is a story draped in history, a work of fiction inspired by actual events in the silent film era. But you need not be a film historian or familiar with the events to appreciate the gifts of Revoyr's enthralling tale. This well-crafted, engaging novel will appeal to mystery lovers, film buffs, and anyone who appreciates the pleasures of captivating prose and a story you can't put down. The book also offers an intriguing exploration of racial politics, the tenacity of self-deception, and the consequences for our understanding of stories---our own and others'---when we view them through the eyes of an unreliable narrator.

As with her two previous (and equally superb) novels, Revoyr brings her characters and their surroundings alive for the reader, evoking a vivid sense of place in scenes both past and present. The protagonist, Jun, may at first seem to have little in common with many of Revoyr's readers. Yet through her skillful presentation of his humanity and his gradually dawning self-understanding, Revoyr makes Jun a character we unexpectedly relate to. If you're already a fan of Revoyr's work you'll appreciate how she just keeps getting better and better. If you're first encountering her here, you're in for a treat. Either way, this book will make you eager for more.

Despite the 5 other reviews here, who seem content with this book, I am quite ambivalent about it. I saw the Desmond-Taylor & N.M. Minter + her mother story right away and it almost spoiled everything. I liked the story enough to read all the book though.
Jun Nakayama is terribly dull as a person (I would even say he is quite a coward most of his life) that all the characters around him seem very alive (the japanese actress Minatoya is luminous). And he is surprised at how life has changed since the 1910-20's without aknowledging how much he fleed everything all the time. There isn't much in this character to make us feel like following him in his toughts, reminiscenses or whathever he constantly debates. BUT, it may be intentional i.e. maybe the authoress wanted him to be that way.
Hopefully, Ms Revoyr didn't really base Nakayama on Sessue Hayakawa memoirs (she used his autobiography)...
An interesting book, however "facile", if you are not aware of the real-life scandals that occured in Hollywood in the 1920's.

Nina Revoyr's third literary novel is an intriguing mix of silent film history, written from the point of view of a man who has hidden components of his life both from himself and others. ....Like her previous books, it is clear that Revoyr both knows and loves Los Angeles history.