Customer Reviews

Forever

5 star:		(80)
4 star:		(41)
3 star:		(29)
2 star:		(22)
1 star:		(22)

 

 

Pete Hamill is a legend of New York, and FOREVER feels very much like his magnum opus. It's a wonderfully well thought-out and well researched history of New York City as told through the eyes of one fictional character.

Cormac O'Connor, a young 18th Century Irishman, through an accident in the street and a colision with a mystical destiny finds himself travelling to make a new life in America in the 1740s. Here, he becomes embroiled in a quest for justice, power and vengeance against the man who drove him from Ireland. After an encounter with a powerful shaman, Cormac finds himself granted a power that can be the greatest blessing or the darkest curse...immortality. the only condition is that he never leave Manhattan Island.

The following 250 years trace Cormac as he witnesses and becomes part of the development of NYC. Watching him through the slave revolt, the War of Independence, the War of 1812, the great New York fire, the nineteenth century boomtimes and the tragic events of September 11th, we see Cormac experience life's great emotions, love, loss, success and failure.

Combining a beautiful telling of Celtic mythology with a rich and vibrant civic history, Pete Hamill has created two truly remarkable characters...one is Cormac o'Connor and the other is the City of New York.

Read FOREVER and be glad that you did. It is certainly worth it.

This novel has a lot going for it. It's by Pete Hamill, a New York City columnist who understands the gritty realities of the city and whose writing is clear and to the point. It's therefore as much about the history of New York City as it is about the lead character. The plot is unique too. A young Irish man, Cormac O'Conner, comes to New York City in 1740 and is given eternal life - just as long as he doesn't leave the borough of Manhattan. Well, that's a book I can relate to. I live in Manhattan myself, and figure that even if I don't travel much, I do live in the best place in the world. And so I expected to embrace this book completely.

At 613 pages, this is a novel to sink into. I looked forward to picking it up again every time I had to put it down. There's a lot of action and colorful images and a true sense of New York City through the years. There's love and war and a quest for revenge. Obviously, the author did a lot of research. However, he tried just a little too hard to make Cormac politically correct at all times, fighting injustice, particularly against African Americans, throughout the book. And, just in case the reader forgets the fact that Cormac has eternal life, the author has him constantly reflecting on the history we have just seen him live through. This is all right up to a point, but it's unnecessarily repetitive and often bogs down the story.

The book is strongest at its beginning and ending sections. The beginning really gets into the life Cormac led in Ireland as well as his early years in New York. And the last section, which incorporates the recent 9/11 tragedy into the narrative, is full of tension, especially since I knew it was coming and kept wondering how the author would have the story play out. I did enjoy the book, but it was more from a point of view of "isn't this interesting" instead of getting deeply involved with a complex character. Also, even though Cormac talks about the fact that he cannot leave Manhattan Island, it's mostly talk. There is no plot development that seriously puts him on the brink of a bridge or tunnel or river landing with a decision about leaving Manhattan to make.

The book is an excellent review of New York City history as well as a narrative of both the Irish and the African American experience in this city. However, it lacks in making me really care about the characters. However, I did find myself drawn back again and again to the book and wanting to find out what happens next. I therefore do recommend it, especially for New York lovers with an interest in history.

Billed as a piece of "old-fashioned storytelling at a gallop" [cover quotation from the Washington Post], this swashbuckling tale certainly lives up to the description, although the gallop has a few wild leaps in it. Blacksmith's son Cormac O'Connor emigrates to New York from Ulster in 1740. There, he is given the magical gift of staying young forever, provided that he never leaves Manhattan, and that he "truly lives." Cormac is an attractive character: a fighter and a lover, friend of the dispossessed, and increasingly adept as a linguist, artist, and musician. But the real hero may be the city of New York, seen at various periods from the early days to the present. Hamill the historian is every bit as good as Hamill the storyteller.

I have remarked in other reviews on the tendency of several recent novelists to play around with the way their central characters experience time -- a sort of American Magic Realism. In Andrew Sean Greer's THE CONFESSIONS OF MAX TIVOLI, the hero lives his life backwards. In Audrey Niffenegger's THE TIME TRAVELER'S WIFE, he skips around freely in time. In Salman Rushdie's THE MOOR'S LAST SIGH, he ages two years for every one. All three writers use their device both to generate suspense and to focus more clearly on the inner life of the character. But while the immortality granted to Hamill's hero makes a wonderful means of displaying the changing face of the city, it greatly reduces the reader's interest in the character himself.

It is significant that many reviewers on this site praise the opening third and the last quarter of the book, for both these extended sections tell a relatively straightforward story over a single span of time, the one a tale of revenge and discovery in the 1740s, the other a love story in 2001. The intervening sections, set in the American Revolution, the New York cholera epidemic, and the time of Boss Tweed, contain interesting material but develop little momentum or continuity. It is hard to invest in a hero whom one knows cannot be killed, who does not age and so has no continuing friends, and who must keep reinventing himself every few decades so as not to draw attention to his eternal youth. The story of Cormac's growing awareness of his world in adolescence is gripping because his education happens painfully in real time, knowledge born out of tragedy and the need for courage and compassion. But later, when all it takes to master a new language or new skill is to devote himself to it for thirty years or so, the process just seems too easy. One can still take pleasure in Cormac's flesh and blood in the short term (parts of the book are splendidly erotic), but in the long term he has no reality at all.

The "old-fashioned storytelling" compliment applies mostly to the first section of the book. The last portion, by contrast, is more complex, more truly novelistic. Hamill has told how he first finished the book on September 10, 2001, but then felt he had to go back and add chapters leading up to the attacks on the Twin Towers. This final section has quite a different momentum from the rest, because it is clearly driving towards a terminus rather than moving aimlessly outwards from a distant beginning. It also contains the most nuanced personal relationships in the book. But in thus changing the tone, Hamill gets into trouble reconciling the simple moral absolutes of the earlier part of the book to the less black and white world of the present day; it is as though he had been writing an Old Testament, and suddenly found himself in the midst of the New! I cannot say that all the resolutions are satisfactory, but the last moment of all, when Cormac returns to the place where he had originally been given his immortality, contains a touch of surprising grace that, to me, feels exactly right.

... this was not the book that I expected it to be. Every plot summary of this novel describes it as a history of New York City as experienced by a man who is granted immortality only so long as he never leaves the island of Manhattan. Granted, that does happen, but first you have to slog through an annoying, practically-a-novel-in-and-of-itself three hundred pages of trifling backstory (taking up roughly half of the novel's length). That would have been fine if only it had been more interesting. Hamill seems to back himself into a corner with a curiously apathetic protagonist, Cormac O'Connor, who goes about tracking down the man responsible for the deaths of his parents with all of the passion of a man running errands on his day off. After arriving in Manhattan he wastes time doing ... nothing really. He learns a trade as a printer's apprentice, dabbles in a relationship that he doesn't seem too passionate about either, and agonizes about how he really kinda should be looking for his sworn enemy. Imagine Hamlet without any of Shakespeare's wit or dramatic urgency to redeem him and you have a pretty good idea of how frustrating Cormac is. The only thing he feels passionately about is fighting slavery, which ultimately - perhaps fatefully - leads to his gift / curse. That's another sticky point of this novel for me: there is no grey area when it comes to political issues such as slavery. All of the good guys possess an inexplicably modern perspective when it comes to social issues, while the villains are fierce racists who strive to use slavery to their own advantage. It's so simplistic, and not historically accurate. I find it hard to believe that people who were raised in a society where slavery and racism were so ingrained into the mainstream would instinctively know how to think outside the box.

The historical aspect of the novel is often interesting when Hamill draws out episodes of history that are unfamiliar, such as the period when Manhattan's water supply was severely restricted by greedy bureaucrats in the 1830s (leading to city-wide pestilence and frequent cholera outbreaks), but it is less so when Hamill indulges in a lust for big cameos and cheesy set-ups, such as when Cormac saves General Washington's life during a skirmish at the onset of the American revolution, screaming "We need you alive, God damn you!" (again, it seems, Cormac has been blessed with an unnatural prescience). And despite his ardor for throwing off the shackles of tyranny, Cormac engages in some pretty misogynistic relationships with women (his mandate for eternity in Manhattan even includes an order to "love women," and while it also orders him to respect and protect them it still results in a series of non-emotionally attached relationships that essentially reduce the woman to the means for sex only).

A lot of people seem to enjoy this book, and I suppose I can see why. What I offer here is a different perspective from someone who did not enjoy it ... at all, really.

Incidentally, I don't know why Amazon only lists this novel as available from individual sellers, because it is still on the shelf in bookstores as of this review's publication date (take it from me - I work in one).
Grade: D+

Ok, I don't ever write reviews of anything, but after reading a few of the negative reviews here I had no other choice than to post a review of my own. This was one of the best novels I've ever read - Period. I gave up on reading novels years ago because my imagination was far better than any story anyone else had written - I could always figure out what was about to happen next - and I would lose interest very quickly and never finish a book. But this book grabbed me by the shirt collar and carried me through to the end at light speed, all the while DYING to know what came next.

Someone once asked me if I'd read any good books lately, and I told them about this one. They asked me to explain the plot, and I did - to the best of my ability without giving away any of the "good parts". They looked at me like I had three heads, and said, "Uh, no thanks, not my kinda book..." I told them not to go on what I told them but to just read the book for themselves, and they refused. A year later, I was talking about books with someone else, and they asked me the same question. I told them that I'd loan them "Forever", but they couldn't ask me anything about it, they just had to read it. They agreed. Three days later, the book was back on my desk with a Post-It stuck to it reading, "This book was THE BEST!!! Bought one for myself!!! THANK YOU!!!" After discussing the book with them, they said that they didn't want the book to end... Yes, it's that good.

This is a book for those of you who can keep in mind that it's a NOVEL, a STORY... SUSPEND YOUR DISBELIEF for a moment and ENJOY what he's written... Geez Louise! Some people here need to RELAX! lol!

Don't miss this story... it'll take you all of a day and a half to finish it because you won't put it down...

I could not put it down! I did not want it to end! Who will play Cormac in the movie? I simply lost myself in this book and had a difficult time coming back to reality. I know and love New York City which is a definate plus as I could immediately picture where every section of the story took place. Those of you who do not know New York start reading and learn.
The review of this book in the" New York Times Book Review "is so badly written I fear will keep many from reading the book. I do not know why an art editor was reviewing it.
This novel makes history come alive, you know these people and you laugh, cry, love and die with many of them.
Only after I finished it, did I realize that it was also a lesson on how we are all in this world together and how we need each other, whether it be in Ireland, or in New York on 9-11, our lives are interwoven.
Keep writing Mr. Hamill. There will be a whole world of new fans waiting for your next book.

Through the life of one man, Cormac O'Connor, Hamill leads the reader into the morass of human brutality, vice, art, nobility, passion and the grinding boredom that so often describes the arc of individual lives.

The book has three main rhythms that roughly divide the story into thirds. The opening rhythm is an active experience of Cormac's odd heritage, his parents' love for him and one another, the passion of his father's work and a believable melding of Gaelic myth and lore. This rhythem sets the foundational values of Cormac's life in the subsequent rhythms. It takes Cormac to a burgeoning New York City that has already passed from the Dutch to the British. It is here in the 1700's that Cormac encounters much brutality, death, despair and hardship.

Yet Cormac is a young man of deep passion that grows out of the conviction and inculcation of his people. His nature leads him to be an advocate for the weak oppressed by British rule and this deep value inside his soul leads to the next rhythm: the onset of eternal life, bounded by the shores of the island of Manhattan.

The second rhythm is at first passionate and full of wonder. Yet as the story ebbs, the full nature of the rhythm surfaces: life is plodding and repetitive, it lacks color and taste. It is boring. It is shocking in its acceptance of cruelty, indifference and isolation.

At first I thought that Hamill had lost focus because Cormac took no action against any Warren during this rhythm. And frankly, I thought the story was muddled. Eventually, I came to wonder if Hamill wrote this intentionally, much as Steinbeck wrote the Grapes of Wrath with a ponderous, plodding narrative to convey the despair, monotony and desperation of migrant workers. I think Hamill's intent was to convey the awful durability of human faults as he experienced them after scores and scores of years in his eternal life.

Almost suddenly, the third rhythm arrives with the new millenium and Hamill's placement of contemporary brands and landmarks brings the reader into the New York City of today. Cormac easily and quietly circulates at an art exhibit near Rudy Giuliani and Madonna. He buys coffee at Starbucks. He plays improv jazz at a smoky club. And his life moves inexhorably toward September 11, 2001.

In these three rhythms, Hamill masterfully paints the history of New York at times with cursory strokes and at other times, with a detailed glimpse into the odd reality of being human in New York City. This is a stunning story told by a wonderful storyteller. The story is informed by Hamill's deep love for New York City and an intriguing bibliography. It has moved into the sparsely populated domain of My All Time Favorite Books, in which only Steinbeck's East of Eden and Stephenson's Cryptonomicon exist.

"Forever" is the story of an Irish immigrant on an Inigo Montoya-esque lifelong quest for vengeance, as he follows the murderer of his father and mother to America so he can tell the killer to "prepare to die". Upon arriving in a burgeoning little town called New York City, he befriends an African practitioner of black magic who grants him eternal life (so long as he never leaves Manhattan).

Thus, the story of our hero is also the story of New York City, from its humble roots as a tiny settlement nearly as savage as the wilderness around it to the modern day metropolis. He fights with the original George W(ashington), experiences the business practices of Boss Tweed and in a passage that would make George Constanza proud, enjoys reading Mike Lupica.

Meticulously researched, "Forever" realizes it is as much a history book as a testament to the characters in the story. Thus, admirable detail is given to all the worlds inhabited in the text, from the eternal fires built in the mud houses of 18th century Ireland to the role email plays in the lives of today's New Yorker.

But sadly, the novel is episodic. Rather than smoothly transitioning through nearly three centuries of the growing city, the chapters jump ahead (sometimes as many as a hundred years). I imagined this novel being similar to those stop-action nature films that show seeds becoming trees or a carcass slowly rotting away. But the growth of NYC is not a seamless tale in this book. A more tidy, efficient use of the material would have made this possible (the first third of the book is given to the 1740s and the last third is given to 2001).

And so with these choices, the author has decided that the story of the principle character is more important then the story of New York itself. He gets bogged down with whether our hero wants to live forever and quotes some very Braveheart-like philosophical nonsense about what it means to "truly live" rather than just existing. I would have liked to have had more of New York, like eating hot dogs and drinking beer with Babe Ruth or painting the town with Frank Sinatra. So much of this town's heritage is left out.

The dustjacket promises an epic and for the most part this book does not disappoint. Noted columnist, memoirist, and novelist Pete Hamill, seemingly (but perhaps not) drawing some inspiration from the pop-fantasy franchise Highlander, has dreamt the story of Cormac O'Connor, who (without spoiling the suspense) arrives in New York in the 18th century and is promised eternal life so long as he never leaves Manhattan. Anyone who hears that deal and wonders "So what's the catch?" will adore this book. As an encomium to New York it has few peers, but the storytelling unfortunately does not quite live up to Hamill's ambitions. The narrative consists of just three epochs of Cormac's life, separated by decades, even jumping from the 19th century directly to 2001. Insofar as this unfurls a 600+ page story spanning 300 years that /never/ drags or meanders through tedious exposition, that's a refreshing quality, but it also leads to a novel that is, one might say, a few chapters short of an epic. The resulting story sometimes reads like an abridged version. A more significant flaw in the novel is Hamill's compulsion to insert figures of historical significance, almost in Forrest Gump fashion. Cormac's friendship with New York political-machine boss William Tweed seems almost to overcome disbelief, but when Hamill attempts to introduce George Washington in a speaking cameo, he falters. It would take a writer of Shakespeare's caliber to render someone of Washington's stature believably. Hamill is no Shakespeare, but noone could hope to match Hamill's knowledge of the contours and history of New York unless he were actually an immortal who had lived in the city for three centuries. Hamill writes Cormac brilliantly as a hero inculcated with a keen sense of decency and an instinctive distaste for injustice of all kinds. But Manhattan is in fact the main character and hero of this novel, and Hamill has contrived the perfect vehicle for telling the story of the first three hundred years of its own eternal life.

The premise of the novel, that Cormac O'Connor lives for centuries in New York City requires taking a giant step into fantasy, however once the reader is drawn into the life of this "immortal everyman," the story becomes compelling and absorbing. The author, a respected journalist and novelist, has crafted a masterful tale of an Irish Jew who is magically given immortality, provided that he never leaves the isle of Manhattan. From the mid-1700's until the present day September 11th events, Mr. Hamill weaves a richly textured story of history and individual experience.

There are times when some elements of the story suffer from excessive "political correctness," however, the characterizations are rich, the plot is simple with just enough twists to make it interesting, and the themes are universal (justice, compassion, etc.). This is a fine novel, both thought provoking and entertaining at all levels.