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18 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Women in Black, May 22, 2002
With this book blurbed by Franzen and Foster Wallace you know sort of what you're in for: verbal brilliance, unusual settings, darker humor. Costello does not disappoint. His novel about Vi, a Secret Service agent assigned to an unnamed Vice President in the midst of a Presidential campaign, also tells of Vi's larger family, her collegues, their 'down time' lives, and a refracted view of America. While Costello seems to fit right into a certain subcategory of novelists (afore mentioned Franzen and Wallace--what category would that be labelled I wonder?) he isn't a clone. He has a more narrative driven, accessible novel here, one where you get to care about some of the characters; certainly he is very very talented with the language; quick wit.
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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Partly comic, partly serious, and certainly different., June 18, 2002
Often described as a light-hearted "riff," rather than a satire, this novel of government and politics casts an eye on the Secret Service and its all-too-human agents. Working to protect an unnamed Vice-Presidential candidate on a pre-primary visit to New Hampshire, the assigned agents are also dealing simultaneously with their own insecurities, quirks, and numerous dysfunctions. As this wry novel evolves, the reader discovers that the differences between those we employ to protect us and those we want to be protected from may be very slim, indeed.
Half a dozen Secret Service members, their spouses, parents, children, and lovers; an equal number of computer programmers for Big If, a multiplayer war game on the Web; and the Vice-President, his staff, and campaign workers constitute a huge cast of characters, but each is so idiosyncratic, and the minutiae of his/her daily life so completely articulated, that the characters are memorable, if not fully developed. As Costello expands his scope beyond that of the campaign, he pokes fun at child-rearing practices, prison work-release programs, the real estate market, the expectations of newly-moneyed trophy wives, the addiction to violent computer games, and even the get-out-the-vote efforts of campaign volunteers.
The reader must be patient with this novel. Plot is not a major concern, as the book meanders through the lives and backgrounds of multiple characters. Vi Asplund, the main character, receives only slightly more emphasis than other characters, and conflict and dramatic action are minimal, dependent more upon the characters' past histories than upon new events. Delightful metaphors ("a tall, soft sofa of a boy," "a snippy poodle kind of sneeze") are sprinkled throughout, but they are sometimes buried in long lists of detail. The humor often feels self-conscious. This is a most unusual novel, one which defies the conventions and pushes the boundaries, and I suspect that few readers will remain neutral about it. Mary Whipple
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Americana Done Right, December 13, 2002
This book is more or less plotless, but engrossing to read nonetheless. One of the factors that accounts for its 'readability' is the subjects and environments that Costello writes about is a fictional milieu no one else seems to have a solid command over; and Costello does a knock-out job of bringing this slightly skewed vision of Contemporary America that is chillingly close to the real world. The novel traces the days in the lives of several men and women, most of whom are in the Secret Service, and online PC game behemoth corporation called the BigIf. Not only are the quotidian details of these lives meticulously delineated, they are mimetic in the best sense of the word; the novel's vision of America's political climate and condition of its people are dead-on, and disconcerting. The novel doesn't have a perfunctory 'build-up', but the there is a climactic event in the very end, the very last few pages of the novel. I was most impressed with Costello's handling of the event. In the hands of lesser writers, this event would have turned into an operatic coda of noise and unchecked bathos and forced epiphanies. Costello doesn't give in to such urges and remains true to his aim - which is to render a truthful writer's vision of what is going on, with this country, and with us. The writing is protean and restrained. There are moments of lyricism in the prose, but they are like a welcome breeze. My minor reservation about the novel is that Costello seems too bent on controlling all facets of the novel, and there is a constricting feeling you get from reading the book that hinders from the experience. (Kind of reminds me of Richard Powers, another great writer who's a bit too fastidious.) But it's a minor gripe that really has no significant bearing on the achievements of this book.
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