Wonders of the West [Hardcover]

Kate Braverman (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 20, 1993

Newly arrived at her brother's home in 1960s L.A., teenager Jordan Lerner struggles to deal with her brother's terminal illness, her mother's dalliances with a string of men, and a school where she is considered an outcast.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The accomplished Braverman's ( Palm Latitudes ) latest work seems destined to draw unfavorable comparisons with Mona Simpson's Anywhere but Here . Like Simpson's novel, it concerns a girl whose feckless young mother uproots them both to California in search of fame and fortune; however, Braverman's plotting is stale and heavy-handed. Jordan is only 10 when Roxanne (nee Ruth) plans their escape from a middle-class existence in 1960s New Jersey, choosing her brother Louie's home in Los Angeles as a destination. The car trip bodes ill--Roxanne is forced to pawn her possessions when she can't locate her targeted hosts along the way; Roxanne and Jordan are reduced to sleeping in their car; the eponymous Wonders of the West, billed as a tourist attraction, is a thudding letdown. Braverman splices scenes from this trip into Jordan's account of her senior year in an L.A. high school, where she is flunking five subjects despite her 157 IQ, while Roxanne, now posing as Jordan's sister, scrounges for movie studio work and hunts for a sugar daddy. Louie and his wife have indeed taken them in, but Louie is ill with cancer and their apartment is part of a depressing complex reserved for hospital patients and their families. Braverman's prose style is characteristically incisive and her observations both witty and unsparing, but these talents barely justify this sadly predictable excursion.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

In her own voice, 17-year-old Jordan Lerner details her meager existence with a terminally ill uncle and his wife in early 1960s Los Angeles, then relives a harrowing cross-country trek with her neglectful mother. Braverman's lyrical fourth novel, which follows Squandering the Blues ( LJ 9/1/90) and Palm Latitudes ( LJ 6/1/88), demonstrates why she was twice nominated for a Pulitzer Prize in poetry. But even as readers dreamwalk with Jordan through her lush garden of description, they may grow weary of hacking away at the overgrowth. In addition, Jordan's eventual steps toward liberation are not totally convincing for a young woman beset with Cold War fears and an unusually high level of angst and apathy. Hasn't Jordan already learned before that the "wonders of the West" may be illusory? For literary collections.
- Faye A. Chadwell, Univ. of South Carolina Lib., Columbia
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 280 pages
• Publisher: Fawcett; 1st edition (January 20, 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0449906566
• ISBN-13: 978-0449906569
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.3 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,414,600 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Poor on the outside, privledged on the inside, February 9, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Wonders of the West (Hardcover)

Anyone who grew up poor on the outside, but privledged on the inside will appreciate this book. Jordan is having a wreck of a childhood no thanks to star-struck LA adults, her father's cancer, vapid neighborhood children, her McCarthy minded guidance counselor, and her mother's relentless insecurities. As a result, she cultivates a righteous arrogance that will give courage to anyone under the age of twenty. While 60s flower-power culture doesn't seem like it would have been my chosen escape from the insanity, I can understand how the amazing cultural power of youth at the time set up an inevitable backlash on the youth of today. This is my favorite Braverman book - the most potent, the most troubling. There is a reason that this book is out of print!!