Customer Reviews

If Men Were Angels: A Novel

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
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I highly recommend Reed Karaim's suspenseful, complex first novel. While on the most basic level it presents itself as a political thriller, it also offers the careful reader a myriad of subtle riches. Karaim has a poet's ear for language (the audio cassette must be a delight), and a keen eye for pop culture in today's America. His experience in the 1992 presidential campaign helps render the all-too-believable clash between a reporter's implacable search for facts and an ambitious Senator's spin machine. With his easy command of small, yet startling insights that suggest Updike, Karaim has fashioned a densely populated story set on the grand stage that is America. Like a Montana landscape in winter, it gives us the terrible beauty of truth -- and its consequences. It's a winner.

This is an especially instructive book as we head into another major election. Reed Karaim, who has done his time as a journalist on the presidential campaign trail, takes a step back from the action here and offers a literate, important novel that is far greater than the sum of the daily, discordant parts that go into a campaign. This is the world of sound bites, wire dispatches, canned stump speeches and cynical journalists, elevated to the emotional and intellectual level of Greek tragedy. Cliff O'Connell, the reporter-narrator, pursues a potentially career making story, but one that could destroy a worthy candidate and a worthy man. It's a fascinating exploration of ambition, truth, and ethics in the maelstrom, but the real appeal is in Karaim's deft prose. When the idiocies of the daily campaign and its coverage start to get you down, pick up this volume to remember why the process is a noble one, after all.

Did George W. Bush do cocaine? Whether you care or not, a presidential campaign once again is becoming a frenzy of speculation and possible scandal over something that may have happened decades earlier in a candidate's personal life. Decisions are made about how much to tell, how much to reveal, how much to hold back. By the candidates, by the reporters who cover them. Their lives can be changed by what they choose, and the nation's life can be affected as well. Want to know what it feels like inside? Read Reed Karaim's book. A compelling and often suspenseful tale, it takes you inside a fictional campaign to watch how these characters of politics and the press dance with one another and around one another and how their histories and values guide their decisions about truth and deceit. One revelation of my own: I am a friend of Karaim's. I am also a political writer, and I know a terrific book when I see one.

By the bottom of the first page, I was clearly on for the ride of "If Men Were Angels." I believe Karaim has achieved something truly important: a near-thriller, highly plausible, which makes us readers question our own ethical hierarchies. I also admire this writer's capacity for both indelible images and that "sense of a room" which I recognized repeatedly but could not have put into words myself.

This is excellent presidential campaign year listening! Karaim sees both the grind of the campaign and the issues clearly. Candidate Thomas O Connell, a fundamentally decent man who is concerned about his country, is victimized by scandalmongering related to issues that probably should have been no one's concern. The book helps us take another look at the media--and at our expectations of our leaders.

It isn't the greatest political novel ever written, that award has to go to "Primary Colors", however for a debut it isn't bad. Being someone who works in politics and reads a great deal of politically related books, I think the book has moments of great campaign text, but gets a little weak in the sappy, sometimes drawn out paragraphs about O'Connell's former girlfriend. At times I found myself skipping whole pages to get back to the story, which is much more entertaining and certianly more exciting. Overall a good book, that had the potential for greatness. Would recommend to friends after it comes out in paperback.

"If Men Were Angels" is a powerful and poetic work of fiction. Beautifully written by Reed Karaim. I found myself unable to put the book down. Having followed Clinton during the 92' election, Karaim brings an insight that only someone who has been there could. Karaim has an extraordinary talent for pointing out the little things in life. Although the book is primarily a political drama, there is just enough humor to keep the story moving along at a brisk pace.

I don't want to give away the plot, but the story is about a reporter who is following an underdog presidential candidate. At first, the candidate appears to be too good to be true. But as the reporter digs deeper into the candidate's past he discovers that things are not always as they seem. There is a romantic subplot involving an ex-girlfriend who suddenly reappears in the reporter's life. Anyone who has been through a messy break-up will be able to relate to this part of the story. There are many twists and turns leading up to the surprising conclusion.

I read about three to four books a month and this is the best book I've read in a long time.

I highly recomend this book.

Ann Shin

I don't write many reviews anymore; it seems a tedious, unrewarding exercise. But this book is so beautifully written and so inspirational to the reader, that I just had to write this review. Don't miss the deep pleasure of reading this book. It is a treasure. Most writers would give an essential body part to be able to write this well. I also want to record my deep thanks to the author for the experience of perusing his work.

I slogged my way through this novel, after picking it up at a big discount simply because I like political novels and there simply aren't many to choose from.

While the author, Mr. Karaim, goes to great lengths to set scenes and capture the (boring) dynamic of covering a national political campaign, I found the plot predictable, overwrought, and only somewhat believable. It didn't help that I figured out the BIG SECRET way before the main character, and the twist at the end was wholly unsatisfying and somewhat cliche. (It was also non-believable, given the circumstances, sorry, Mr. Karaim.)

The writing is fine, if not my taste in first-person narration. I just don't think that first-person POV novels should include so much unnecessary descriptive language just to capture the aura. And the themes were hard to fathom, since the masses -- which is the way the rest voters of us are portrayed -- swing wildly with no sense of balance or afterthought. The media reports something and the public goes berseck. Um. I don't think so.

Is this what publishers want? Is this waht publishers think the public wants? I'm guessing no if I could pick up the hard-cover so cheap. I'm also guessing that Mr. Karaim could do better. He's always having the characters NOT do what they want, which is not how people behave. The story reads as if an editor red-penned more interesting plot twists in favor of safe choices.

In the end, the story says nothing of note about politics, media, the public, morality, or anything else. I can (and have) done better myself.