Customer Reviews

The Yiddish Policemen's Union, limited edition

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A hard boiled homicide detective, beaten by the world, finds himself awoken, bottle in hand, by the manager of the flea bag motel where he now finds himself in residence. Another resident, a junkie, has been murdered, bullet to the back of the head, assassination style. Likely this set up sounds familiar, the opening to countless novels penned by Mickey Spillane/Raymond Chandler wannabes. Not so for Michael Chabon's gripping "Yiddish Policeman's Union" for this detective, Meyer Landsman works the mean streets not of New York or Chicago or Los Angeles but the Sitka Alaska Federal District, home to 3 million Jews given temporary refuge in 1939 from the growing maelstrom of Hitler's Europe.

Chabon's novel weaves such a creative and tight web one hardly knows where to begin. With the author's well researched alternative history where the Jewish State of Israel fails still born in 1948 and the so-called "Frozen Chosen" build a home in the far north? With his cleverly imagined Yiddish slang and the fully realized city of Sitka, offered to the reader in such detail that one can smell the cheese on the blintzes in the cafeteria where Landsman often dines, see the snow on those dark cold streets, remember the short lived excitement of Sitka's hosting the '77 World's Fair, and taste the famous cherry pie served by the non-Jewish couple in Sitka's airport? Or, perhaps, this being a work by Michael Chabon, a reviewer should dwell on the themes of alienation, identity, and redemption which form the current that runs through all of that excellent author's work? Any of these would be worthy topics to consider and I could wax poetics regarding the "Yiddish Policeman's Union's" success with each.

Yet spending too much time on any of these might detract from the pleasure readers are sure to find in this wonderful novel. As with Chabon's previous work, the perfectly sculpted sentences, laden with pathos and a sly wit, will surely give readers pause. Likewise will you come to feel you know his characters as though old acquaintance, such as Berko, Landsman's cousin and partner, a half Indian orthodox Jewish bear of a cop, with his two children and a third on the way. For all of these reasons, any reader will find much to delight in this excellent novel, perhaps Chabon's best to date. With skill and humor, he has elevated the noir genre, paid homage to the likes of Raymond Chandler, and given you a gift that you will surely treasure.

Yet another astonishing work by Michael Chabon, "YPU" is his most ambitious book to date, operating at once on many levels (detective yarn, alternative history, cultural critique to name only a few) with varying, but mostly dazzling degrees of success. Whether or not it equals the brilliance of "Kavalier and Clay", "YPU" stands as a breathtaking tour de force. This is clearly the product of a man in his 40's who, embarking on the second half of his life, grapples with his accustomed themes of heritage, identity, alienation and self-doubt with greater maturity and poignancy than ever. Central character Landsman (whose name marks him as a "fellow Jew," thus casting him as, if not an archetype, at least a surrogate for his neighboring strangers in a strange land) wanders the frozen wilderness seeking answers among a collection of memorable personalities, as he rushes to outrun a clock that ticks away the days until a new-millennium diaspora severs all his ties with everyone and everything he has ever known. The star, as always in Chabon's work, is the writing itself -- perhaps a bit over-weighted with metaphors and similes, but all of them so spot on that one happilly grants him his excesses. Gripping, hilarious, ingenious and, finally, deeply touching, "The Yiddish Policemen's Union" is an indespensible treasure from one of the great writers of our time.

Michael takes your into an alternative reality where the Jewish refugees from WW2 settle in Alaska, not Israel. The protagonist is a detective trying to solve a murder that nobody cares about. It leads him into a complicated web of international intrigue and mystery. The characters are richly detailed and colorful. The plot moves along nicely and use of language, especially similes, is often breathtaking. Keep your Yiddish dictionary at hand to get the full impact of the dialog. The climax is a bit contrived and stretches the envelope in term of suspended disbelief. But the overall effect is satisfying. In the movie, the lead role should be played by Woody Allen who can portray an obsessively analytical Jewish man with a comic flare while still suffering from a heavy dose cultural pathos and unrequited love. Peter Falk would be my second choice because of his appearance and especially his wardrobe. His sidekick cousin, half Jew half-Indian, would be more of a casting a casting challenge. The protagonist's ex-wife, also a detective, would be played by Julia Loius-Dreyfus. The staging would be easy...lots of rain, slush, fog and old buildings ...The Bronx in February. The technical guys can just do computer simulation on the mountains in the background. It will be a lot less expensive than building a synagogue and a dozen kosher delicatessens in Sitka Alaska.

said the words out loud those who had assumed Yiddish was a language of the past only, suddenly felt it had been revived. . . . It seemed to be saying `khbin nisht vos ikh bin amol geven. I am not what I once was. Ober `khbin nisht geshtorbn. Ikh leb. But I did not die. I live." Irena Klepfisz.

Yiddish is certainly not dead in Michael Chabon's "The Yiddish Policemen's Union". In fact, the primary language of Jews throughout the "Pale of Settlement" (where Jews were allowed to live in Imperial Russia) suffuses this book with the rich aroma of a language whose every word can take on a paragraph or even chapter of meaning in the hands of the right speaker. Chabon is one such speaker (or writer) and "The Yiddish Policemen's Union" is a book that is rich in enjoyment.

"The Yiddish Policemen's Union" is an artful blend of genres, a blend of crime fiction and alternate history. I think of it as a blend of Dashiell Hammett's dark crime stories like "Red Harvest" and Philip Roth's alternate-history novel "The Plot Against America".

Chabon has created a world in which there is no Israel. Rather, Israel had been crushed in the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. Since that time the United States, partly as a result of guilt over the Holocaust has created a temporary homeland for displaced European Jews in and around Sitka, Alaska. Yiddish, not Hebrew, is the primary language. As the book opens, close to 60-years after the end of Israel, Sitka is due to revert back to U.S. control and the million or so inhabitants face the prospect of being stateless refugees. The hero, or protagonist, is Detective Meyer Landsman. Like one of Dashiell Hammett's characters he is a flawed, down-on-his luck cop with nothing much going for him except a strong sense of right and wrong and a personal integrity of the highest order. He is a drunk, he is divorced (and his ex-wife is his commanding office) and he lives in a flea-bag hotel. He is awakened out of something of a stupor and told a murder has been committed in the hotel.

It does not quite do Chabon's book justice to say that the story line is primarily that of Landsman's investigation into the murder of this stranger in his fleabag hotel. That is certainly how the book plays out. However, that is simply the structure of the book. As in Hammett, there is a murder in a town filled with greed and corruption and the path Landsman must walk is filled with hurdles and hidden minefields. As in Roth, the story of Landsman (which in itself is a Yiddish word that may be roughly translated as fellow countryman) is the story of a people set adrift and apart. It is a story of a people bobbing in a sea without an anchor, without a homeland. It is poignant but, ironically, it is poignancy without the schmaltz.

Chabon's writing, like Yiddish itself, is rich and thick with meaning. But more importantly, it is both funny and thoughtful. The barbs and insults and sarcasm with which the characters express their fondness for each other and their scorn and loathing is, in my opinion, dead-solid perfect. As I read "Yiddish Policemen's Union" I could envision the body language and sense the arched eyebrows or sneers on the lips of the characters as words come tumbling out of their mouths in a torrent.

Although I won't say anything to reveal the plot, I think Chabon shows excellent pace and timing in developing the plot. He neither rushes to expose too many details too soon nor leaves everything to a summary revelation at the book's climax. Chabon keeps the pot boiling and that kept me turning page after page after page long after I should have turned out the lights for the night.

One slight cautionary note: I grew up in a Queens, New York neighborhood at a time when Yiddish words and expressions were sprinkled liberally throughout every conversation both in my family's apartment and throughout my neighborhood. However, if you don't have any prior experience with Yiddish I suggest going on line and keeping a Yiddish-English web page handy if you find you have any difficulty with the odd word or phrase. Ultimately the pleasures of this book so far outweigh the minimal burden of pondering the occasional strange word. I mention it just so the potential reader is aware in advance that they might see a few words that may not be readily understood by every reader.

I got a great deal of pleasure from reading Michael Chabon's "The Yiddish Policemen's Union" and recommend it heartily. L. Fleisig

I found the book very difficult to read , i don;t understand the jewish terms and found the book very confusing. i was very disappointed.

I can't believe that not only was this 'book' published but that Amazon had the nerve to recommend it. Not only is the book poorly written but it has a lousy plot(is that what they call it?) Save your money..I will be more than happy to send it to someone who might need paper for their 'outhouse'.
Jerre Issod