Panama (Paperback)

by Thomas McGuane (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal
McGuane writes "like he's engraving each work in stone," said LJ's reviewer of this novel (LJ 12/15/78). The plot finds drugged-out and washed-up rock star Chet Pomeroy trying to get his act together in wild and wonderful Key West, Florida.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review
"Thomas McGuane is the pool shark of our prose. His sentences click with imperious precision.... The words swerve with fatal charm."

-- Christian Science Monitor

"This is the first time I've worked without a net." The speaker is Chester Pomeroy, a washed-up rock star turned casualty of illicit substances and kamikaze passion. But we may also read these words as an aesthetic statement from Chester's creator, Thomas McGuane, who has made Panama a high-wire act of extravagant emotion and steel-nerved prose.

As he haunts Key West, pestering family, threatening a potential in-law with a .38, and attempting to crucify himself on his ex's door out of sheer lovesickness, Chester emerges as the pure archetype of the McGuane hero. Out of his struggle to rejoin the human race -- and the imminent possibility that he may die trying -- McGuane has fashioned a harrowing and hilarious novel of "alligators, macadam, the sea, sticky sex, laughter, and sudden death."

"Whatever risk McGuane may have sensed in attempting [Panama], the feat proves successful. The audience is left dazzled." -- The New Yorker -- Review

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Product Details

• Paperback: 192 pages
• Publisher: Vintage (May 30, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0679752919
• ISBN-13: 978-0679752912
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.2 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #409,206 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars My favorite novel, August 18, 1999

By A Customer

Not the best novel I've ever read, surely. Probably not even the best novel Thomas McGuane ever wrote. But it's definitely my favorite.

It's hilarious and awful, with its elliptical, toothless, and wildly unreliable screaming-misfit narrator careening pitiably through what might be a midlife crisis if we had any confidence that he was going to make it to 50. (It's a major win for Chet Pomeroy when he finally remembers his dog's name.)

The dialogue is so spare that in my first hurried read through the book I could hardly understand what the characters were saying to each other. Now huge hunks of it are in my memory. ("I have a friend who owes you a minimum of a lawsuit." "That's a very silky opening," says the agent, "but I'm always being sued.")

This is a very, very funny book, even when it is also being poignant and awful. I just love it.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Delirious, funny, tragic romp, July 8, 1998

By	[e-mail] (Los Angeles, CA) - See all my reviews

One of my favorite books ever. Chester Pomeroy is a semi-retired glam-rock singer hanging out in Key West, FL. He may be penniless. He may be the descendant of a long line of shipwrights. He may be related to Jesse James. He may have married his estranged girlfriend in Panama a few years before. You don't know because he has short term memory loss. A classic McGuane character study about a would-be larger than life screwup, this book is a must-read. The McGuane prose and dialogue, fast, poetic, and memorable, are here in full force. The darkly funny details are what you remember: Chester builds his own wishing well to raise money. He nails himself to his girlfriend's door. She hires a private detective to find his memory. If you can find this book anywhere, don't hesitate. Buy two copies so you can loan one to your friends.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars a treatise on memory and redemption, January 12, 2001

By	glen moore (Chicago, IL) - See all my reviews

I once saw Thomas McGuane at a booksigning and asked specifically about this book. He said it was semi-autobiographical, dealing with the enormous pitfalls of fame. Chester Pomeroy is a timeless character--funny, damaged, and mythic. An Everyman for our age. McGuane's prose resembles shards of glass on a downtown sidewalk in deepest summer: reflective, but insistent that we look at the depths between the spaces.

Just the image of crawling out of an elephant's sphincter is worth the price of admission. Genius.