Customer Reviews

Oh What a Paradise It Seems

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3 star:		(1)
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1 star:		(1)

 

 

This book is only a 100 pages and their is so much in a few words. "She was as women go relatively punctual and He had come to believe that punctuality in engagements was an infallible gauge of sexual spontaneity. He had observed that,without exception, women who were tardy for dinner engagements were unconsciously delayed in their erotic transports and that women who were early for lunch or dinner would sometimes climax in the taxi on the way home." IF you like that passage you will enjoy this book. Read more John Cheever.

This is lovely Cheever. So few pages, and yet so much substance. A book of great truths told through small details. Understanding the difference between those who would or wouldn't stop to pick blackberries on the shoulder of a massive interstate highway ...

I would often pause and reread a paragraph - amazed that something so insightful could be so relatively insignificant within the context of the story. I thoroughly enjoyed myself in this read of an old man, feuding neighbors, love, dissapointment, insecurity, greed ... and American life.

It's not my place to be glad for Cheever, but I felt a sense of satisfaction for him - for the fact that he got this wonderful work done before he died.

My only critique is that the environmentalist message gets a little too preachy and loses the subtlety a message embedded in a novel should have. Mind you - I have no issue with the message - only with the way it is presented towards the end of the story. But like his main character - Cheever was an old man with a purpose. And if he was desperate for his cause - such that he stepped slightly over the line between fiction and nonfiction ... well for that he should be forgiven.

A worthwhile read, which I read on a rainy evening as suggested. It is now 2:00 am, and the book is back on my shelf. I am only saddened that Cheever left no more stories after this one.

Oh, What A Paradise It Seems is John Cheever's last novel, published just before his death in June 1982. It differs from his previous works, which mainly focused on suburban commuters, as it tells the story of an older man, but it still retains Cheever's wit and surrealness. The astonishing thing about this book is how deep the story goes, and yet it is only 100 pages long. It would take other authors 400 pages to write this story. It is, as the first sentence says, "A story to be read in bed in an old house on a rainy night."

"Oh What a Paradise It Seems," by John Cheever, is a short novel (100 pages in the paperback edition) about an elderly man named Lemuel Sears. He sets out to save Beasley's Pond, in the town of Janice, from destruction by polluters. The story follows both his quest and his active love life, weaving his life together with those of a number of other people: an environmental crusader, an amorous doorman, and more.

The book has a pretty straightforward story, but throughout there is a slightly weird feeling; some parts of the book have a quality that reminds me of a David Lynch film. The book takes a brief and oddly unsatisfying detour into the subject of bisexuality. Overall the book is OK--it held my attention, but didn't do much more than that, although Cheever's prose style is often quite lovely. Give it a try.

Lemuel Sears,an elderly but sprightly gent, is distraught when unscrupulous town hall officials in cahoots with organized criminals, designate his favourite beauty spot-Beasley Pond-as a dumping site, befouling and polluting the water and surrounds.
In between a couple of love affairs-one a man , one a woman, and a near brekdown he enlists the help of Chisolm,an environmentalist to fight his corner. We also get to meet Betsy who doesn't get on too well with her neighbours....
And all wrapped up in 100 pages! This is an entertaining novella that had the same feel for modern life as Saul Bellow's 80's novellas 'The Actual' and 'A Theft'.
With good humour Cheever questions the road the modern world is taking-despoiling our environs and lives for ever faster ever changing ways that seem to serve no other purpose than greed.
The world constantly changes,the human psyche demands it, but-as Cheever suggests-we're moving away from paradise, not towards it.
Another pleasing read from a master story teller.

As a young reader, I recall becoming immersed in the short stories of John Cheever and being fascinated with his erudite perceptions of life. Each story is about real people, real problems, but each has a richness of meaning and personal growth for the characters and ultimately the reader. Cheever's illustrious career was defined by personal confusion, alcoholism, and rejection. Yet, in spite of the difficulties, his writing often contains a positive realism that demonstrates belief in the good.

Oh What a Paradise It Seems reads like a series of interconnected short stories that come together in different ways. The characters are neither all good nor all bad with the exception of the political figure introduced near the end of the book. Using the social plot of concern over the future of a small pond located near the community, Cheever traces the myriad reactions to the problem, demonstrating the tragedy of modern life. His seemingly simple stories that are told describing different situations all contain hints of the insecurities that lie malignant under the surface of many people. From the man struggling with his own sexual identity, the mistake of forgetting a child, the woman who cannot seem to handle sudden wealth, and the dedicated but sad efforts of benevolence, this short novel contains complexity to place it among the finest of Cheever's achievements.

Superb prose and smooth, intelligent writing adorns this outstanding book. While the plot is not necessarily original nor particularly interesting, it is the people and their actions that stand out as unique. Perhaps its very conciseness and lack of emotionalism is its demise, and yet those very traits lend themselves to reader interpretation. Some writers tell the reader what to think and what to feel, but Cheever encourages readers to seek their own responses and make their own decisions. It is refreshing to read a book that describes people without excessive sentimentality.

Sometimes the aside stories did ramble a bit and did not always add to the story, making the book seem a little incongruous. In addition, I was disappointed in the shocking sadness that occurred near the end. Yet, I thought this was a solid, inviting read, and a quick indoctrination into the world of John Cheever.

"Oh What a Paradise It Seems," published shortly before John Cheever's 1982 death, is his fifth and final novel. It follows his previous novel, "Falconer," by five years and marks a return in tone and style to that of the earlier Cheever novels. If "Falconer" can be said to be Cheever's "prison novel," "Oh What a Paradise It Seems" is his "environmental novel."

Lemuel Sears may be fast approaching old age but his interest in women, especially those younger than him, is as passionate as it has ever been. Always on the make, even when he finds himself standing in a long bank teller's line, Sears manages to strike up a brief conversation with an attractive, much younger, woman that leads him into a rather one-sided love affair. As with so many previous male characters created by Cheever, Lemuel is at a disadvantage in the relationship because Renee remains as big a mystery to him throughout the relationship as she was the moment he first spotted her waiting in line ahead him.

Lemuel is a man of means who still enjoys some of life's simpler pleasures and he looks forward to the hours he spends ice-skating on little Beasley's Pond when it freezes over every winter. When he discovers that the pond is being purposely filled in and polluted by illegal dumping at the profit of the local mafia, Lemuel hires his own lawyer and scientist to fight those responsible for destroying the pond and endangering the health of everyone living near it.

Even though, at barely 100 pages, "Oh What a Paradise It Seems" is technically more a novella than a novel, Cheever, always the master short story writer, includes in it an interesting subplot or two to more fully flesh out his characters. As is so often the case in Cheever's novels, too, one of the main characters is a reluctant, but active, bisexual male who struggles to control the guilt he feels about his hidden sexual nature. This is such a common theme in Cheever's work that it is a wonder that the truth about his own sexual nature remained a well-kept secret until after his death.

Cheever barely lasted long enough to complete "Oh What a Paradise It Seems" before he died of cancer, and he may have intended it to be longer than it turned out to be. However, he packs so much into the novel's 100 pages that readers will find that it truly does read more like a novel than a novella.

I caught this title from the series 'Judging Amy'. Great triggers in that series. It was very thought provoking...so many levels...I must read it again. Would be a good discussion book, but I enjoyed it all by myself. Do they still read this in college? Maybe my nephew has thoughts...I never read this author before and I liked it.

This starts off wonderfully. If he'd just stopped after the skating, which would have made a great short story, it would have been vintage Cheever. Instead he went downhill all the way with a witless turn toward too broad satire. What a disappointment.