Customer Reviews

The Winter Zoo: A Novel

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

First things first. This is an amazingly well-written book with an impressive cast of characters. I was also pleasantly surprised by Beckman's fair depiction of Poland and its people--he resisted the obvious temptation to be condescending. On the other hand... While the first 150 pages were gripping, the ending was simply ludicrous and made me lose a lot of respect for the novel. (Apparently, if you can't figure out what to do with your characters, you just throw them into a couple of orgies? Right, whatever.) A lot of the sex scenes in the book felt gratuitous to me, and I'm not the kind of guy who minds sex scenes in books at all. There are also plot holes you could fly a plane through. Oh, and Beckman's Polish (and this is a minor gripe) is very erratic--there are tons of misspelled words and inappropriate verbiage. This won't bother most people but if you happen to speak Polish, it will drive you crazy. In the end, however, all that is forgivable. It is the plot that ruins The Winter Zoo. And given the author's natural gift for hypnotic, poetic language, that's a shame.

Not since Henry Miller's 40 page letter --to a woman he never met --have I been so seduced by an epistolary musing. A breathless jaunt through the dirty snows of Poland complete with young bohemians, incestuous affairs, illicit gaming halls, earth-worm soup and damn good writing, Beckman's extraordinary Winter Zoo is a necessary elixir for anyone who's secretly harbored an expatriate yearning. Pour yourself a tall glass of absinthe and enjoy.

The idea of casting Poland as a land in the grip of a sexual free-for-all at the end of Cold War is pretty funny to anyone who's ever spent time there. A giant pansexual Christmas orgy, complete with underage boys and girls, at a big hotel in the middle of Krakow, advertised all over town on handbills? Can you say "police with machine guns breaking it up?" Beckman's take on things kinda reminds me of the old German stereotype of the sexually-wild Slav (similar to racist American stereotype of oversexed blacks.) There's very little basis in reality here. Certainly, Germans on average give it up easier than the super-Catholic Poles.

Of course, this being a novel, Beckman isn't necessarily required to portray Poland accurately. I think he is required to create interesting characters rather than the wearisome cartoon characters he comes up with: the sexy young Polish teenager; her sexy mom; the big, credulous Iowan galoot; said Iowan's sexily satanic cousin, etc.

Just about everyone in the novel enthusiastically engages in (large) group sex (except for the villain, a tortured ex-commie official tormented by his sexual needs, blah blah.) I tried to determine if there was some complex symbology at work. Nah, I think the author likes writing group sex scenes. If you like reading such scenes, this might be the book for you. Otherwise, probably not.

I recently purchased "The Winter Zoo". Throughout the experience of reading it, I couldn't help but feel absolutely enthralled by it. A year ago I spent 10 months living in Warsaw, Poland teaching English. I was able to travel to the beautiful city of Krakow on several occasions. John Beckman's accurate look at Krakow and Polish people is reason enough to buy the book. Even though the novel itself is fiction, Beckman is extremely accurate when describing Krakow. The unique thing about this book however, is Beckman's ability to create for the reader a city brewing with sexual intrigue and hidden dangers from a traditionally medieval city. Mr. Beckman chooses to stray away from the "traditional" sense of Krakow and instead opt for a more adventurous thriller. I reccomend this book to anyone interested in Eastern Europe and all the wonderful suprises it has to offer. I look forward to reading more of John Beckman in the future.

Rarely do I read a book that stirs in me an awe of what little black letters on paper can do to my heart. John Beckman's Winter Zoo is one of those books.

This was a compelling read once I got into it. I found the description of life in Poland at that time period fascinating.

I had the same problem as many others. The first 3/4s of the book were excellent, but the ending was very frustrating and unsatisfying.

John Beckman has written a terrific novel. Not just an accurate depiction of post-Communist Poland and the people who live there, but a highly intriguing story capable of capturing the minds of readers in any setting. The fact that it takes place in one of the oldest cities in Eastern Europe is just icing on the cake. Well developed characters put Beckman ahead of contemporaries like Coupland or Palahniuk, and the plot and dialogue is as entertaining as any I've read. The Winter Zoo should find its way to your bookshelf this fall.

I flew through the first half of the book fascinated with the characters, the location and wondered where it would lead to. A dead end was the final destination. Nothing was resolved, justice was not mete out, confrontations that should have occurred did not and by the end of the novel I had nothing but contempt for all of the characters. Overall this book was a big disappointment. For a good book on Eastern Europe I would recommend Prague or the Russian Debutantes Handbook.

This review is for the Henry Holt first hardcover edition 2002, 348 pages. THE WINTER ZOO did not rank in the USA Today list of top 150 best sellers.

In September 1990, Gurney, the 22-year old protagonist, abandons his lover and their newborn daughter in Iowa and flees to Kraków, Poland, to live with his cousin Jane in a boarding house. Fond of adventure and fun, Gurney becomes embroiled in the kooky and sometimes kinky lifestyles of Jane's friends, his landlady and her estranged husband Zbigniew, and their daughter Wanda. Tormented over forsaking his daughter, Gurney keeps her a secret, but as the entangled relationships unravel he discovers that Jane, Zbigniew, Wanda and their wayward friends have secrets too.

The writing is good, but there are some quirks. The dialogue is without quotation marks, which occasionally is confusing, as are a few abrupt switches in the point of view character. The first seventy pages are sprinkled with some obscure mythological references, and throughout the metaphors are often puzzling to the point of distraction. The abundant and mostly unnecessary use of Polish words is stifling. Still, the passions and fears of the intriguing cast of characters are gradually and fully developed in a nicely intertwined story.