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Saint Mazie: A Novel Hardcover – June 2, 2015

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Jami Attenberg (Author)
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Jami Attenberg (Author)
3.8 out of 5 stars 197 customer reviews
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Product Details

  • Hardcover: 336 pages
  • Publisher: Grand Central Publishing (June 2, 2015)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 1455599891
  • ISBN-13: 978-1455599899
  • Product Dimensions: 6 x 1.2 x 8.8 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (197 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #136,180 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Top Customer Reviews

3.0 out of 5 starsSome very good characters, but ...
By JLee VINE VOICE on June 1, 2015
Format: Hardcover Vine Customer Review of Free Product ( What's this? )
I wanted to like this book more than I actually did. The real Mazie must have been an incredible person. This fictionalized account is part hit and part miss. It tells Mazie’s story through numerous sources – in fact, a few too numerous for my taste. Most of this story is told in the form of entries in Mazie’s diary, started when she was a child, with excerpts from Mazie’s unpublished autobiography and interviews with people who knew Mazie directly or indirectly.

The real-life Mazie was famous for helping bums and drunks during the Depression, but that part of her life comes very late in the book. Until then, we keep hearing what a colorful character she was, a real good-time gal, living during a tumultuous time in world history: the first World War, the Jazz Age, Prohibition, the Depression. Unfortunately, when it comes to Mazie, there is too much saying and too little showing or doing. I was expecting a free spirit, a Jazz Baby, a flapper. No. She’s a snooze.

She seems to spend most of her adult life working and drinking -- stagnating. She’s stuck, at an early age, in a dead-end job, living with her sister and her sister’s husband; sitting in a ticket booth (her “cage”) all day long at his theater. She complains about life passing her by, but she never does anything about it. This at a time when women have achieved the vote and are out in the work force, driving cars, experimenting with life. I kept wondering why she didn’t just leave or at least get a different job. I never felt I knew her or understood her, and I did not find her very interesting or likeable – or colorful -- and I couldn’t figure out why everyone in the book keeps saying how wonderful she was.

The secondary characters, however, are wonderful.Read more ›
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4.0 out of 5 starsA modern-day saint?
By Jill Meyer TOP 500 REVIEWERVINE VOICE on May 4, 2015
Format: Hardcover Vine Customer Review of Free Product ( What's this? )
In 1940, Joseph Mitchell, a writer for "The New Yorker", wrote a series of essays about New York City. One featured a woman named Mazie Phillips Gordon, who was known throughout the poorer parts of the city as "Saint Mazie". She spent the Depression-era years helping the down-and-out, those poor men who slept in the streets and begged for food and drink. She'd pay for them to sleep in shelters and pass out money for them to buy food. She'd call the ambulances when they were sick or dying. Mazie Gordon gave poor men - "bums", as others called them - some dignity in their lives. The "New Yorker" article was real, the men were real, and Mazie Gordon was real. But, who was she? And what were her motives for helping as she did?

Author Jami Attenberg has taken the bare facts of Mazie Gordon's life and has written a novel based upon those facts. She has added her own interpretation of Mazie's life and extrapolated a story. How much of the story is true is unclear, past the basic facts. But Attenberg - whose latest novel was "The Middlesteins" - has created a woman who, both in her own words in diary form and those of relatives and friends, is someone you won't soon forget. She was the owner of a theater and she worked the box office. Facing the street, she saw the rough and real life of Depression-era New York City and felt compelled to help those she could. But she had her own life, too, and it was filled with interesting people who she loved and who loved her.

I finished the book a bit curious about why Jami Attenberg chose to write a fictional account of the life of Mazie Gordon, rather than a non-fictional one. I suppose I would have preferred reading a biography of this fascinating woman who helped so many needy. I hope that someone will write a bio of Mazie. Until then, I'm satisfied with this excellent novel.
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5.0 out of 5 starsMazie Doats (and Dozie...)
By enubrius VINE VOICE on May 3, 2015
Format: Hardcover Vine Customer Review of Free Product ( What's this? )
If this weren't based on a true story and an actual human type person, you would swear it was the hokiest of fiction.

Not only that, but a fiction from the 1930s/40s when people like Frank Capra or Preston Sturges were making movies.

And make no mistake, this reads like one of those great movies of that era... only much, much, better

I fell in love with Mazie by page 3, and I'm a cynic.

You will love her by page 2; you'll love the book forever; and, trust me, you'll REALLY love the style, talent, and grace of Jane Attenberg a voice like no other, today
3 Comments 74 people found this helpful. Was this review helpful to you? Yes No Sending feedback...
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2.0 out of 5 starsAttenberg not able to pull the format off
By Julie Failla Earhart on June 2, 2015
Format: Hardcover
Mazie Phillips’ story opens in1907 when she receives a diary for her 10th birthday. Rescued from her abusive parents and poverty in Boston by her sister, Rosie, she is now a New Yorker. Mazie LOVES New York. She loves it streets, the men and women who live there, the air, everything. The diary entries are typical of a developing young lady. As the Jazz Age blossoms, Maize blossoms. The entries are spasmodic until about 1916.
Rosie had married a wealthy man who owns the Venice movie theater. Now Rosie is sick, and Mazie needs to help at the theater. Her brother-in-law, Louis, needs someone who is honest and good with money. Therefore she is put in the ticket cage. She feels like a caged animal.
Mazie knows everyone in the neighborhood---from the bums to the upper lower class. That’s who lives in the Bowery. Then the Great Depression hits. Poverty and homelessness become more widespread. By this time, Mazie owns the Venice and throws it open to those most in need. Oh, she’s still showing the movies, but those who need a warm/cool place to stay for awhile are welcome.
The diary entries continue to be spasmodic and include a chorus of voices that help fill in Mazie’s story. While Attenberg’s story ends in 1939, the “Queen of the Bowery,” as she was known, died in 1961.
I was attracted to this story for two reasons: 1) Supposedly more than 90 years after Mazie began writing in her diary, it’s discovered by a documentarian in search of a good story. However, readers never hear from the movie-maker until the last third of the book. It didn’t work for me. 2) Maize was a real person living; she was profiled in Joseph Mitchell’s Up in The Old Hotel, a collection of short stories based on real people.
I was never able to get into the plot or the characters. In my opinion, Attenberg wasn’t able to pull off the story. That’s why I’m giving Saint Mazie two out of five stars.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 starsFour Stars

A great snapshot of early lower East side N.Y.

Published 17 days ago by J.K.Widing
3.0 out of 5 starsA historic fiction leading readers through life of a group ...

A historic fiction leading readers through life of a group of New Yorkers in a period from 1900 to the thirties. Well written and interesting.

Published 23 days ago by Barbara
4.0 out of 5 starsA limited world

It took me a while to get into this book, and in fact I put it aside for quite a while. I liked the diary format of the story, but there wasn't that much going on in the early... Read more

Published 26 days ago by Peter J. Orvetti
5.0 out of 5 starsWonderful book

I was born in 1936 around the corner from the Venice theater and remember sitting in the balcony with the bums smoking cigarettes when I was a kid. Read more

Published 1 month ago by george l. cassissa
4.0 out of 5 starsA great easy read about a time in history we can ...

A great easy read about a time in history we can sometimes forget. Mazie was a great character and the way the author put together the parts of the diary with testimonials was a... Read more

Published 1 month ago by Greta McKeand
3.0 out of 5 starsUnusual Tale of NY City

This was an interesting read, but did get somewhat confusing when it jumped from Mazie's story to other characters input. I enjoyed
Mazie's portion of the book. Read more

Published 1 month ago by Gypsy Angel
3.0 out of 5 starsvery good character study

I would give it 3-1/2; very good character study, interesting characters and relationships, and held my interest, once I got into it. Read more

Published 1 month ago by Nancy J. Boyce
4.0 out of 5 starsBased on a true story

I loved that this book was based on an actual character who lived in NYC and took care of the homeless during the Depression.

Published 2 months ago by Carol K. Askin
1.0 out of 5 starsI am so happy to be done with this book only because I ...

I am so happy to be done with this book only because I have been struggling through it for weeks. Maybe it is the disjointed style - diary entries intermixed with snippets of third... Read more

Published 2 months ago by Nancy R.
3.0 out of 5 starsTrouble

I had trouble this book. Twice it jumped to the last page. It wouldn't go back to my last page read. Read more

Published 2 months ago by Valerie Roen

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