Customer Reviews

Destiny Express

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Howard Rodman's stylish novel about the relationship between Friz Lang and Thea von Harbou in pre-war Nazi Germany is a swirling melange of cigarettes, adultery, boredom, disaffection, creative arrogance, longing, helplessness and pretense. His deliberately complex, disjointed writing style -- while feeling slightly affected at times -- does a wonderful job of capturing the ennui, anxiety and overt fashionability of 1930's Berin. The pacing is slow and lingers on details, both vital and trivial. This languid pace is rarely bothersome, instead invites the reader to laze in the richness of scene that results.

The bad news is that the plot gets lost under this capricious writing, especially towards the end of the book. I am sure this is deliberate, and it's admittedly effective at times. But the major discoveries and decisions that drive the story are often only hinted at or noted in passing while the author is busy describing other minor thoughts and scene details at length.

The result is a book that is luxurious and though-provoking, but ultimately less satisfying at the finish than it should be.