The Baker: A Novel [Hardcover]

Paul Hond (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 17, 1998

Evocative of the classic urban tales of Bernard Malamud, James Baldwin, and Henry Roth, Paul Hond's The Baker is an unforgettable story of romance, music, and bread set in contemporary Baltimore.

The baker is Mickey Lerner--family man, ex-boxer, Jewish merchant, a man of confused passions who exists in a community polarized by racial mistrust. One day, Mickey's life is changed by a shocking crime, forcing him to explore the mysteries of his marriage and the awkwardness of life with his eighteen-year-old son. Mickey must also face the racial tension surrounding him--a legacy of violence between blacks and whites that threatens both his family and his bakery. Above all, Mickey must confront himself: his feelings, his desires, and the memory of a tragic event from his past.

Paul Hond has written a profoundly moving novel that never flinches in describing the dynamics of race and class, while offering a poignant vision of redemption. Powerful and compassionate, The Baker is a timeless work of fiction by a young writer whose voice will linger in the memory of readers for years to come.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

The son of prosperous Jewish shopkeepers in Baltimore, Micky Lerner made a try at boxing and then settled down to running a bakery. He adores his wife, Emi, a concert violinist leading a separate life; she often tours abroad and is always practicing when at home, while Micky and their disconsolate teenage son, Ben, tiptoe around so as not to disturb her. Their lives are changed horribly when, during the racial tensions that arise after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Emi is shot and killed as she and Micky walk to their car. Micky goes off to Paris, Emi's home, to try to resolve his grief, leaving the bakery in the hands of his son. There he meets a baker and starts baking bread again. Though somewhat restored by this experience, he must still face continued black/white violence when he returns home. Speaking of hope, redemption, and reconciliation, the upbeat ending of this complex debut novel doesn't seem justified by the fatalism expressed throughout, but the storytelling is good. Recommended for all libraries.?Molly Abramowitz, Silver Spring, MD
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Kirkus Reviews

A debut novel that transforms the terror of working-class, inner-city race relations into an upbeat examination of love, loss, and father-son bonding. Set in Baltimore, Hond's appraisal of the cultural and economic barriers that isolate blacks and Jews recalls the bitter urban tragedies of Dreiser and Malamud. Mickey Lerner, a robust, sixtysomething Jewish bakery store owner, is alienated from his wife, Emi, a French-born concert violinist who no longer sees in him the integrity that once attracted her. Meanwhile, their 18-year-old underachieving son, Ben, spends most of his time smoking dope with Nelson Childs, the bakery's delivery boy, who just bought his first illegal handgun from a street-corner junkie. After a hundred pages of meandering flashbacks, often ending in alleys as dark as the decaying neighborhoods that Hond clearly loves, we learn that Mickey, at Ben's age, coulda-been-a-contenda as a boxer, but gave it up to run the store after his baker father died of a heart attack; that Mickey's last bout was against Nelson's father, who eventually abandoned his family; and that Mickey has harbored an earthy but unconsummated sexual attraction for Donna, Nelson's mother, ever since. The story takes off when Mickey and Emi are robbed on the street by a pair of masked black youths, one of whom panics and kills Emi. At first, the tragedy makes everything worse: Grief-stricken Mickey takes off for Paris in search of secrets in his wife's past, leaving Ben in charge of the bakery. And as a boss, Ben can't cope with Nelson, who buckles under the humiliating treatment he gets from bigoted customers and falls in with his criminal buddies. Fortunately, though, Hond wisely doesn't let his tale lurch to a violent climax but, instead, lets his characters find each other again as they uncover their hidden strengths. A bright Beaujolais of a book: fresh, optimistic, and sophisticated enough to satisfy on many levels. -- Copyright ©1998, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 360 pages
• Publisher: Random House; 1st edition (March 17, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0679456732
• ISBN-13: 978-0679456735
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.3 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,444,142 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A beautiful, thoughtful read..., March 8, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Baker: A Novel (Hardcover)

The Baker is a rich, complex yet simple story of family love and the complexities of inter-racial as well as cross-cultural relationships. There are so many elements and relationships to think about...the son and his search for a nurtuting mother, the black friend/employee's place in the Bakers and his own family....a look at family business....crime, father-son love....and much more. It's so refreshing to read about characters thought processes while grapling with so many plot intricacies....Wonderful and memorable, thanks Paul Hond... please write more!!

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Glorious, December 16, 1998

By 

Edith Sobel (Fort Lee, New Jersey) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Baker: A Novel (Hardcover)

Who amongst us has not bitten into a fresh loaf of well-baked bread - just bread- and not known what bliss is? In a neighborhood of halfed baked, over stylized, designer designed commercial publishing "doughs", The Baker is a standout. Rising like a "well-needed" examination of urban life with all its racial implications scattered like kimmel (seeds)between the slices, The Baker is utterly satisfying and totally filling. Thank you Paul Hond for enriching all my senses, and especially my appetite for good books.-

5.0 out of 5 stars A MASTERPIECE! Insightful, well-crafted, and a great read!, June 12, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: The Baker: A Novel (Hardcover)

Hond's book has a profundity seldom found in fiction today. Racial and class conflict are illuminated brilliantly and sympathetically. The descriptions of the inner city, of suburban middle America, of the old French bakery, are vivid and fascinating. The characters likewise attain a lifelike status: at times, the reader feels as though they are real people she/he might know. This is most true of the title role, Mickey Lerner, trapped between the past and the future, as well as his son Benjamin, caught between Gen-X-dom, cold capitalistic ambition, and the child needing to be loved. Nelson is a little more of a type, the boy-trying-to-escape-the-ghetto. Though there are points where the story seems to lag, the plotting is superb overall; subplot is used to good effect. Hond's prose flows like poetry!