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Sergeant Salinger
"Charyn skillfully breathes life into historical icons." --
New Yorker
J.D. Salinger, mysterious author of The Catcher in the Rye, is remembered today as a reclusive misanthrope. Jerome Charyn's Salinger is a young American WWII draftee assigned to the Counter Intelligence Corps, a band of secret soldiers who trained with the British. A rifleman and an interrogator, he witnessed all the horrors of the war--from the landing on D-Day to the relentless hand-to-hand combat in the hedgerows of Normandy, to the Battle of the Bulge, and finally to the first Allied entry into a Bavarian death camp, where corpses were piled like cordwood.
After the war, interned in a Nuremberg psychiatric clinic, Salinger became enchanted with a suspected Nazi informant. They married, but not long after he brought her home to New York, the marriage collapsed. Maladjusted to civilian life, he lived like a "spook," with invisible stripes on his shoulder, the ghosts of the murdered inside his head, and stories to tell.
Grounded in biographical fact and reimagined as only Charyn could, Sergeant Salinger is an astonishing portrait of a devastated young man on his way to becoming the mythical figure behind a novel that has marked generations.
Jerome Charyn is the author of more than fifty works of fiction and nonfiction, including Cesare: A Novel of War-Torn Berlin. He lives in New York.
J.D. Salinger, mysterious author of The Catcher in the Rye, is remembered today as a reclusive misanthrope. Jerome Charyn's Salinger is a young American WWII draftee assigned to the Counter Intelligence Corps, a band of secret soldiers who trained with the British. A rifleman and an interrogator, he witnessed all the horrors of the war--from the landing on D-Day to the relentless hand-to-hand combat in the hedgerows of Normandy, to the Battle of the Bulge, and finally to the first Allied entry into a Bavarian death camp, where corpses were piled like cordwood.
After the war, interned in a Nuremberg psychiatric clinic, Salinger became enchanted with a suspected Nazi informant. They married, but not long after he brought her home to New York, the marriage collapsed. Maladjusted to civilian life, he lived like a "spook," with invisible stripes on his shoulder, the ghosts of the murdered inside his head, and stories to tell.
Grounded in biographical fact and reimagined as only Charyn could, Sergeant Salinger is an astonishing portrait of a devastated young man on his way to becoming the mythical figure behind a novel that has marked generations.
Jerome Charyn is the author of more than fifty works of fiction and nonfiction, including Cesare: A Novel of War-Torn Berlin. He lives in New York.
265 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 5, 2021
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About the author
Jerome Charyn
221 books229 followersJerome Charyn is an award-winning American author. With more than 50 published works, Charyn has earned a long-standing reputation as an inventive and prolific chronicler of real and imagined American life.
Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Michael Chabon calls him "one of the most important writers in American literature." New York Newsday hailed Charyn as "a contemporary American Balzac," and the Los Angeles Times described him as "absolutely unique among American writers."
Since the 1964 release of Charyn's first novel, Once Upon a Droshky, he has published thirty novels, three memoirs, eight graphic novels, two books about film, short stories, plays, and works of non-fiction. Two of his memoirs were named New York Times Book of the Year.
Charyn has been a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction. He received the Rosenthal Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and was named Commander of Arts and Letters by the French Minister of Culture. Charyn is Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Film Studies at the American University of Paris.
In addition to writing and teaching, Charyn is a tournament table tennis player, once ranked in the top ten percent of players in France. Noted novelist Don DeLillo called Charyn's book on table tennis, Sizzling Chops & Devilish Spins, "The Sun Also Rises of ping-pong."
Charyn's most recent novel, Jerzy, was described by The New Yorker as a "fictional fantasia" about the life of Jerzy Kosinski, the controversial author of The Painted Bird. In 2010, Charyn wrote The Secret Life of Emily Dickinson, an imagined autobiography of the renowned poet, a book characterized by Joyce Carol Oates as a "fever-dream picaresque."
Charyn lives in New York City. He's currently working with artists Asaf and Tomer Hanuka on an animated television series based on his Isaac Sidel crime novels.
Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Michael Chabon calls him "one of the most important writers in American literature." New York Newsday hailed Charyn as "a contemporary American Balzac," and the Los Angeles Times described him as "absolutely unique among American writers."
Since the 1964 release of Charyn's first novel, Once Upon a Droshky, he has published thirty novels, three memoirs, eight graphic novels, two books about film, short stories, plays, and works of non-fiction. Two of his memoirs were named New York Times Book of the Year.
Charyn has been a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction. He received the Rosenthal Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and was named Commander of Arts and Letters by the French Minister of Culture. Charyn is Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Film Studies at the American University of Paris.
In addition to writing and teaching, Charyn is a tournament table tennis player, once ranked in the top ten percent of players in France. Noted novelist Don DeLillo called Charyn's book on table tennis, Sizzling Chops & Devilish Spins, "The Sun Also Rises of ping-pong."
Charyn's most recent novel, Jerzy, was described by The New Yorker as a "fictional fantasia" about the life of Jerzy Kosinski, the controversial author of The Painted Bird. In 2010, Charyn wrote The Secret Life of Emily Dickinson, an imagined autobiography of the renowned poet, a book characterized by Joyce Carol Oates as a "fever-dream picaresque."
Charyn lives in New York City. He's currently working with artists Asaf and Tomer Hanuka on an animated television series based on his Isaac Sidel crime novels.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 37 reviews
August 5, 2020
The inimitable Jerome Charyn has turned his pen to probe the transformative war experiences of one of America's most famous writers, J.D. Salinger. Like so many of his generation, WWII left its indelible footprints on Salinger, as manifested in his stories and his troubled life.
Charyn begins with Sonny Salinger as a lovestruck Park Avenue boy with a few stories under his belt. Sonny was smitten with teenage vamp Oona O'Neill, but Oona had big plans; he was merely a pleasant diversion.
The army decided to overlook Sonny's heart murmur and called him to duty. Sonny went overseas, a secret counterintelligence agent whose job was to seek out and interrogate Nazi collaborators. Oona went to Hollywood where her life plans were altered by Charlie Chaplin. In England, the heartbroken Sonny frequented a local pub, scribbling a story about Holden Caulfield at war.
Sonny experienced the most atrocious killing fields of WWII.
There was Devon's Slapton Sands where 1700 GIs rehearsing for Utah Beach were killed by friendly fire. He was at Utah Beach on D-Day, and at the Battle of the Bulge, and he saw the first liberation of a concentration camp.
Sonny was tasked with sniffing out Nazis and Nazi collaborators in every hamlet. He knew that the people he interrogated were as broken by the war as he was.
The depravity and waste of war was overwhelming. Sonny became a ghost. Frayed, he secretly checked into a German civilian hospital.
Back at work as 'the grand inquisitor', one of the doctors who had nursed Sonny was brought before him for interrogation. He married her, and with fake papers, brought his German Nazi bride home to America to meet his Jewish family.
The marriage failed.
Charyn includes images from Salinger's fiction, especially the Nine Stories--an Eisenhower coat, Sonny at the beach making sand castles with children and remembering Bananafish, hanging in British pubs to write. Salinger's Glass family are referenced, and the carousel in Central Park. Guest appearances are made by Hemingway and Teddy's son General Roosevelt.
In 2018 I reviewed Eberhard Alsen's book J.D.Salinger and the Nazis. When I last read The Catcher in the Rye for book club in 2016, I considered how PTSD influencing the novel. Charyn draws readers on a journey into the darkness of monstrous carnage. As I read, joy was sucked from my world, colors faded, I felt cheerless. Sonny's disillusion and trauma leaves him a tin man, and we understand, because we feel it, too.
A glimmer of hope comes at the end."Whatever music he had lost in the carnage at Slapton Sands, at Hurtgen, and among the smoldering corpses at Kaufering IV had come back."
We know the books that Salinger would write and their impact. Instead of Holden Caulfield's war death, he wrote a novel about a teenage Holden who dreams of protecting children from the adult world. He had seen the devaluation of human lives sacrificed to false gods. And we know how damaged he was, how he became an unsettling, mysterious hermit. Charyn's novel leads us to understand the forces that shaped Salinger and inform his writing.
I was given an ARC by the publisher in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.
Charyn begins with Sonny Salinger as a lovestruck Park Avenue boy with a few stories under his belt. Sonny was smitten with teenage vamp Oona O'Neill, but Oona had big plans; he was merely a pleasant diversion.
The army decided to overlook Sonny's heart murmur and called him to duty. Sonny went overseas, a secret counterintelligence agent whose job was to seek out and interrogate Nazi collaborators. Oona went to Hollywood where her life plans were altered by Charlie Chaplin. In England, the heartbroken Sonny frequented a local pub, scribbling a story about Holden Caulfield at war.
Sonny experienced the most atrocious killing fields of WWII.
There was Devon's Slapton Sands where 1700 GIs rehearsing for Utah Beach were killed by friendly fire. He was at Utah Beach on D-Day, and at the Battle of the Bulge, and he saw the first liberation of a concentration camp.
Sonny was tasked with sniffing out Nazis and Nazi collaborators in every hamlet. He knew that the people he interrogated were as broken by the war as he was.
The depravity and waste of war was overwhelming. Sonny became a ghost. Frayed, he secretly checked into a German civilian hospital.
Back at work as 'the grand inquisitor', one of the doctors who had nursed Sonny was brought before him for interrogation. He married her, and with fake papers, brought his German Nazi bride home to America to meet his Jewish family.
The marriage failed.
Charyn includes images from Salinger's fiction, especially the Nine Stories--an Eisenhower coat, Sonny at the beach making sand castles with children and remembering Bananafish, hanging in British pubs to write. Salinger's Glass family are referenced, and the carousel in Central Park. Guest appearances are made by Hemingway and Teddy's son General Roosevelt.
In 2018 I reviewed Eberhard Alsen's book J.D.Salinger and the Nazis. When I last read The Catcher in the Rye for book club in 2016, I considered how PTSD influencing the novel. Charyn draws readers on a journey into the darkness of monstrous carnage. As I read, joy was sucked from my world, colors faded, I felt cheerless. Sonny's disillusion and trauma leaves him a tin man, and we understand, because we feel it, too.
A glimmer of hope comes at the end."Whatever music he had lost in the carnage at Slapton Sands, at Hurtgen, and among the smoldering corpses at Kaufering IV had come back."
We know the books that Salinger would write and their impact. Instead of Holden Caulfield's war death, he wrote a novel about a teenage Holden who dreams of protecting children from the adult world. He had seen the devaluation of human lives sacrificed to false gods. And we know how damaged he was, how he became an unsettling, mysterious hermit. Charyn's novel leads us to understand the forces that shaped Salinger and inform his writing.
I was given an ARC by the publisher in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.
October 29, 2021
I have never read The Catcher in the Rye and knew little about the life of its author J.D. Salinger before reading this book. However, I’m always fascinated by finding out more about the lives of writers and how their life experiences might have influenced their writing. I certainly did not know about J.D. Salinger’s wartime experiences but in Sergeant Salinger, Jerome Charyn brings these vividly to life showing not only their effect on Salinger but the brutality of war.
We follow Salinger through the preparations for the D-Day landings, the landing themselves and the Allied advance through Normandy and eventually to Paris. Along the way, Salinger experiences firsthand the reality of one-on-one combat with the enemy. ‘It was savagery in slow motion – men snarling, biting, shooting, and ripping at one another in a strange rhythmic dance.’ There are nightmare scenes as Salinger’s division fight their way through the Hürtgen Forest, a forest described as like something out of a fairy tale but one in which the ground is seeded with land mines, German snipers are hidden in pillboxes and mortar shells rain down. When Salinger and his comrades do reach villages that have been abandoned by the Germans they find booby traps waiting for them in the most unexpected places. Worse is to come when Salinger is one of the first to discover the horror of what is euphemistically called a Nazi a ‘labour’ camp but is in actuality a ‘charnel house’. Salinger also witnesses military incompetence and is forced at one point to become complicit in a cover-up on a chilling scale. Understandably it all takes its toll on his mental state.
It’s a far cry from the opening scenes of the book in which Salinger – in pursuit of the love of his life, Oona O’Neill – visits a New York night club frequented by Hollywood actors such as Peter Lorre and Merle Oberon, and rubs shoulders with his literary hero, Ernest Hemingway. (In one of the book’s more humourous moments, Salinger encounters Hemingway again but this time installed in the Ritz Hotel in a newly liberated Paris.)
At one point, Salinger expresses his desire ‘to write sentences that would scorch the reader’s soul like shards of burning ice’. Although there are occasional references to Salinger working on the novel that will eventually become The Catcher in the Rye, I would have liked to learn more about the development of his writing and the influence of his experiences on the book. Possibly this might have been more apparent to me had I read The Catcher in the Rye. Having said that, Sergeant Salinger is certainly a vivid evocation of the brutality and confusion of war, an experience no doubt shared by many other soldiers over the centuries.
We follow Salinger through the preparations for the D-Day landings, the landing themselves and the Allied advance through Normandy and eventually to Paris. Along the way, Salinger experiences firsthand the reality of one-on-one combat with the enemy. ‘It was savagery in slow motion – men snarling, biting, shooting, and ripping at one another in a strange rhythmic dance.’ There are nightmare scenes as Salinger’s division fight their way through the Hürtgen Forest, a forest described as like something out of a fairy tale but one in which the ground is seeded with land mines, German snipers are hidden in pillboxes and mortar shells rain down. When Salinger and his comrades do reach villages that have been abandoned by the Germans they find booby traps waiting for them in the most unexpected places. Worse is to come when Salinger is one of the first to discover the horror of what is euphemistically called a Nazi a ‘labour’ camp but is in actuality a ‘charnel house’. Salinger also witnesses military incompetence and is forced at one point to become complicit in a cover-up on a chilling scale. Understandably it all takes its toll on his mental state.
It’s a far cry from the opening scenes of the book in which Salinger – in pursuit of the love of his life, Oona O’Neill – visits a New York night club frequented by Hollywood actors such as Peter Lorre and Merle Oberon, and rubs shoulders with his literary hero, Ernest Hemingway. (In one of the book’s more humourous moments, Salinger encounters Hemingway again but this time installed in the Ritz Hotel in a newly liberated Paris.)
At one point, Salinger expresses his desire ‘to write sentences that would scorch the reader’s soul like shards of burning ice’. Although there are occasional references to Salinger working on the novel that will eventually become The Catcher in the Rye, I would have liked to learn more about the development of his writing and the influence of his experiences on the book. Possibly this might have been more apparent to me had I read The Catcher in the Rye. Having said that, Sergeant Salinger is certainly a vivid evocation of the brutality and confusion of war, an experience no doubt shared by many other soldiers over the centuries.
January 14, 2021
J. D. Salinger, the highly acclaimed author of " The Catcher in the Rye" never spoke of his years of service during WWII. As a draftee he was assigned to the C.I.C. department of the Army, which was the Counter Intelligence Corps. Here he witnessed every atrocity imaginable, while it was his job to seek out collaborators and interrogate them. Always working in the shadows, never really a part of the regular soldiers.
Salinger was there for the worse of the war, he witnessed a training mission for D-day that was performed at Slapton Sands go horribly wrong, killing hundreds of our own soldiers. He was there with the second wave on the beaches of Normandy, fought through the Battle of the Bulge, and was at the liberation of one of the first Nazi death camps, the stench of burning human flesh still lingering in the air.
Through Jerome Charyn's brilliant rendition of Salinger's life just prior to and directly after the war, we can determine what Sonny, as he was called experienced and how those experiences had a profound long-term affect on him and his writing.
Charyn's style of writing fits the story like a glove. It transports the reader to another time and place so we feel what Salinger felt. There are times in the book where Sonny feels as if he is losing his marbles, as it is so eloquently described, where people, places and events have taken on a surreal feeling. With Charyn's intelligent, witty prose he captures these moments spectacularly and sheds some insight into what made Salinger the man the world came to know.
This book has made me want to go back and reread all of Salinger's works, and to read them with a different eye, one opened to new insight and understanding of the man behind the books.
A 5 star read for sure, a must read for all J. D. Salinger fans. I can't imagine anyone passing this book up. It is truly brilliant.
I received my ARC of this book free from the publisher and in return I am giving my honest review.
#SergeantSalinger
#JeromeCharyn
#BellevueLiteraryPress
#LibraryThing
Salinger was there for the worse of the war, he witnessed a training mission for D-day that was performed at Slapton Sands go horribly wrong, killing hundreds of our own soldiers. He was there with the second wave on the beaches of Normandy, fought through the Battle of the Bulge, and was at the liberation of one of the first Nazi death camps, the stench of burning human flesh still lingering in the air.
Through Jerome Charyn's brilliant rendition of Salinger's life just prior to and directly after the war, we can determine what Sonny, as he was called experienced and how those experiences had a profound long-term affect on him and his writing.
Charyn's style of writing fits the story like a glove. It transports the reader to another time and place so we feel what Salinger felt. There are times in the book where Sonny feels as if he is losing his marbles, as it is so eloquently described, where people, places and events have taken on a surreal feeling. With Charyn's intelligent, witty prose he captures these moments spectacularly and sheds some insight into what made Salinger the man the world came to know.
This book has made me want to go back and reread all of Salinger's works, and to read them with a different eye, one opened to new insight and understanding of the man behind the books.
A 5 star read for sure, a must read for all J. D. Salinger fans. I can't imagine anyone passing this book up. It is truly brilliant.
I received my ARC of this book free from the publisher and in return I am giving my honest review.
#SergeantSalinger
#JeromeCharyn
#BellevueLiteraryPress
#LibraryThing
January 9, 2021
J.D. Salinger is one of my favorite authors. I read Catcher in the Rye every year around Christmas as I return home from college, the time of year I relate most to Holden.
This book is a fictionalization of Salinger’s time in the War and it’s absolutely fascinating. I think context is important to any piece of literature, and that’s what this book provides. Salinger never addressed the war directly in his books or stories , but his characters are often depressed and psychologically damaged. “A Perfect Day for Bananafish” is alluded to several times in the novel, an odd Salinger story about a man who wanders into his hotel room and kills himself. It’s a confusing story until you consider that Salinger was struggling with PTSD, and perhaps writing such a violent story was a kind of catharsis for him.
I found myself loving Salinger even more as a writer at the end of this book, and I look forward to rereading his work with this context.
Thanks to the author, Jerome Charyn who signed my copy and sent it over as a Christmas gift.
This book is a fictionalization of Salinger’s time in the War and it’s absolutely fascinating. I think context is important to any piece of literature, and that’s what this book provides. Salinger never addressed the war directly in his books or stories , but his characters are often depressed and psychologically damaged. “A Perfect Day for Bananafish” is alluded to several times in the novel, an odd Salinger story about a man who wanders into his hotel room and kills himself. It’s a confusing story until you consider that Salinger was struggling with PTSD, and perhaps writing such a violent story was a kind of catharsis for him.
I found myself loving Salinger even more as a writer at the end of this book, and I look forward to rereading his work with this context.
Thanks to the author, Jerome Charyn who signed my copy and sent it over as a Christmas gift.
February 14, 2021
*I received a copy of this book through LibraryThing Early Reviewers.*
Prior to this novel, I knew of J.D. Salinger only as the author of Catcher in the Rye, but in addition to writing a masterpiece, Salinger served in the military during WWII and witnessed many of the horrors of war. Those horrors fill the psychological space of this novel - Salinger is part of the Counter Intelligence Corps, meaning he investigates suspected Nazis and their informants. In this role, Salinger chases shady characters around northern France, arresting and interrogating possible SS officers, and witnessing the horrors of the camps. These sights take a toll, which is how Salinger ends up in a psychiatric clinic and is the mercy of a pretty and deceptive doctor. Overall, this novel made for interesting reading, but it was also hard to read (violence, executions, etc.) as well.
Prior to this novel, I knew of J.D. Salinger only as the author of Catcher in the Rye, but in addition to writing a masterpiece, Salinger served in the military during WWII and witnessed many of the horrors of war. Those horrors fill the psychological space of this novel - Salinger is part of the Counter Intelligence Corps, meaning he investigates suspected Nazis and their informants. In this role, Salinger chases shady characters around northern France, arresting and interrogating possible SS officers, and witnessing the horrors of the camps. These sights take a toll, which is how Salinger ends up in a psychiatric clinic and is the mercy of a pretty and deceptive doctor. Overall, this novel made for interesting reading, but it was also hard to read (violence, executions, etc.) as well.
July 14, 2021
I’m on a mission to read all 50+ Charyn books, so this review is from a true fan. From the Isaac Sidel fever dream New York series to the inner voices of Teddy Roosevelt & Emily Dickinson, Jerome Charyn has a wide range and unique style.
So in Sergeant Salinger, all of this comes together: rich eccentric characters like Oona, Walter Winchell and Hemingway are lightly sketched while the inner workings of Sonny Salinger’s mind are matured and ultimately damaged by war. The final descent chapter is lyrical in my opinion!
So in Sergeant Salinger, all of this comes together: rich eccentric characters like Oona, Walter Winchell and Hemingway are lightly sketched while the inner workings of Sonny Salinger’s mind are matured and ultimately damaged by war. The final descent chapter is lyrical in my opinion!
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
October 24, 2021
3.5
So i only knew J.D. Salinger to be the author of The Catcher in the Rye which I read a few years back after a friend said it was her favourite book of all time.
In this book, Jerome Charyn's Salinger is a young American WWII draftee assigned to the Counter Intelligence Corps, a band of secret soldiers who trained with the British.
*
This engaging story tells us how Salinger witnessed horrors during his time in WW2. Horrors that gave him PTSD and turned him into a mysterious recluse after having spent time in a psychiatric war.
*
Charyn's writing is unique and very engaging. It's not shrouded in waffle and each chapter gets part gets straight to the point. It highlights the the awful truth for a soldier after experiencing the brutality of war.
Thank you to @randomthingstours @jerome_charyn @noexitpress for this brilliant copy.
So i only knew J.D. Salinger to be the author of The Catcher in the Rye which I read a few years back after a friend said it was her favourite book of all time.
In this book, Jerome Charyn's Salinger is a young American WWII draftee assigned to the Counter Intelligence Corps, a band of secret soldiers who trained with the British.
*
This engaging story tells us how Salinger witnessed horrors during his time in WW2. Horrors that gave him PTSD and turned him into a mysterious recluse after having spent time in a psychiatric war.
*
Charyn's writing is unique and very engaging. It's not shrouded in waffle and each chapter gets part gets straight to the point. It highlights the the awful truth for a soldier after experiencing the brutality of war.
Thank you to @randomthingstours @jerome_charyn @noexitpress for this brilliant copy.
April 6, 2021
Jerome Charyn writes an archetypal Jerome Charyn book out of J.D. Salinger’s formative experiences except when diving into the grime of WWII, when he morphs back into his role as the last of the WWII writers (see previous examples: Captain Kidd, Cesare, one of his finest achievements), succeeding the likes of Vonnegut and Pynchon despite the fact that he was less than a decade old by the time it was over. Old soul.
The WWII sequences become somewhat operatic as they advance and then ebb, and are the primary reason to read Sergeant Salinger, and are themselves a spiritual sequel to Cesare, while the rest of the book seems more inspired by Captain Kidd, which also obsesses over New York clothing empires. There’s not a lot of emphasis on Salinger himself, his development as the writer of Catcher in the Rye except to imply he worked on it during the war (which research tells me is about half true). It’s more fun to see him meet Hemingway a few times, less to obsess over the daughter of Eugene O’Neill, a celebrity only a New Yorker could conjure (the daughter, not the playwright), though at least Charyn eventually abandons that arc rather than drive it through the whole book, which is a familiar trope of his. Although it really feels as if the book as a whole is unfocused, treading water, desperate for anchor.
And so I would almost call it a disappointment, except that glorious trek through wartime, in which regardless of who Salinger was or would become, enables Charyn to find focus. There’s an interpretation of the result that makes sense of the decision to write a book this way, that eludes me at the moment. Charyn has been a favorite for more than a decade, a chameleon capable of spinning magic in the most unexpected ways. If this one is yet another surprise, I should of course not be surprised. It’s a late career testament to his unerring ability to keep his readers on their toes.
The WWII sequences become somewhat operatic as they advance and then ebb, and are the primary reason to read Sergeant Salinger, and are themselves a spiritual sequel to Cesare, while the rest of the book seems more inspired by Captain Kidd, which also obsesses over New York clothing empires. There’s not a lot of emphasis on Salinger himself, his development as the writer of Catcher in the Rye except to imply he worked on it during the war (which research tells me is about half true). It’s more fun to see him meet Hemingway a few times, less to obsess over the daughter of Eugene O’Neill, a celebrity only a New Yorker could conjure (the daughter, not the playwright), though at least Charyn eventually abandons that arc rather than drive it through the whole book, which is a familiar trope of his. Although it really feels as if the book as a whole is unfocused, treading water, desperate for anchor.
And so I would almost call it a disappointment, except that glorious trek through wartime, in which regardless of who Salinger was or would become, enables Charyn to find focus. There’s an interpretation of the result that makes sense of the decision to write a book this way, that eludes me at the moment. Charyn has been a favorite for more than a decade, a chameleon capable of spinning magic in the most unexpected ways. If this one is yet another surprise, I should of course not be surprised. It’s a late career testament to his unerring ability to keep his readers on their toes.
October 21, 2021
The Catcher in the Rye has always been one of my favourite novels – definitely one of the books that hooked me to literature in my teens. For this reason I was overjoyed to see a novel on J.D. Salinger’s younger years, an account of his WWII experience and the aftermath. We meet Sonny and his Jewish family: he is a “lanky boy with big ears… and olive skin” (someone teases him as Dumbo). He has published a few short stories in the New Yorker, lives on Park Avenue and accompanies his sweetheart Oona, Eugene O’Neill’s daughter to fashionable venues such as the exclusive Stork Club, where we also meet Hemingway.
But in the streets Posters of Uncle Sam keep calling him, and soon life takes him to war, protagonist of important (and horrible) events such as D-Day landing on Utah beach, which resulted in mayhem, and the liberation of concentration camps. Charyn’s fresh, immediate style does not spare details of the atrocities and brutality young Salinger witnesses, his nervous breakdown, his difficult experience as a Nazi hunter and interrogator, and the mind-boggling relationship with the German doctor and wife-to-be met in a hospital and later in an interrogation room.
The novel, which takes biographical facts as a starting point, paints a haunting, hallucinated picture of a wounded man, a hellish picture of war and Salinger’s tasks as a painful business, and thus posits that his pessimistic world view has been shaped by what he witnessed and PTSD. This is a very interesting interpretation that Charyn espouses and that no doubt can help readers contextualise and better appreciate Salinger and The Catcher in the Rye, a novel gestated in this period. Sergeant Salinger is not Catch-22 but themes and imagery resonate; it is also more immediate and approachable. Well done, engaging and thought-provoking.
My thanks to the publisher for an ARC via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
But in the streets Posters of Uncle Sam keep calling him, and soon life takes him to war, protagonist of important (and horrible) events such as D-Day landing on Utah beach, which resulted in mayhem, and the liberation of concentration camps. Charyn’s fresh, immediate style does not spare details of the atrocities and brutality young Salinger witnesses, his nervous breakdown, his difficult experience as a Nazi hunter and interrogator, and the mind-boggling relationship with the German doctor and wife-to-be met in a hospital and later in an interrogation room.
The novel, which takes biographical facts as a starting point, paints a haunting, hallucinated picture of a wounded man, a hellish picture of war and Salinger’s tasks as a painful business, and thus posits that his pessimistic world view has been shaped by what he witnessed and PTSD. This is a very interesting interpretation that Charyn espouses and that no doubt can help readers contextualise and better appreciate Salinger and The Catcher in the Rye, a novel gestated in this period. Sergeant Salinger is not Catch-22 but themes and imagery resonate; it is also more immediate and approachable. Well done, engaging and thought-provoking.
My thanks to the publisher for an ARC via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
November 11, 2021
Thank you to No Exit press for sending me a copy to review. I am familiar with The Catcher in the Rye, but I knew next to nothing about its author, J.D. Salinger. Grounded in biographical fact and reimagined by Jerome Charyn, we follow Salinger’s journey from an innocent lovestruck young man, to becoming Sergeant Salinger, assigned to the Counter Intelligence Corps and thrown into the depths of the horrors of WWII. We later encounter him as a psychologically damaged recluse with PTSD, after a stay in a psychiatric clinic and a failed marriage. ‘Sergeant Salinger’ also features a lot of real people such as Oona O’Neill, Hemmingway and Charlie Chaplin to name but a few.
The books timeline of events is from 1942-1947, it’s shocking to read just how quickly Salinger's life changed. The author really captures the brutalities of war. Even though we all know what happened during WWII, it was still shocking and horrifying to read about it in such detail. We can’t begin to truly imagine what those involved went through. It is a very sobering book. Although this isn’t a subject I would usually read, I was hooked from the first chapter and very much enjoyed this novel. Charyn is an incredibly gifted writer. I highly recommend!
The books timeline of events is from 1942-1947, it’s shocking to read just how quickly Salinger's life changed. The author really captures the brutalities of war. Even though we all know what happened during WWII, it was still shocking and horrifying to read about it in such detail. We can’t begin to truly imagine what those involved went through. It is a very sobering book. Although this isn’t a subject I would usually read, I was hooked from the first chapter and very much enjoyed this novel. Charyn is an incredibly gifted writer. I highly recommend!
April 2, 2022
Ok read for a break between intense stories. Sometimes that’s the thing one needs. Nicely narrated.
May 7, 2021
Summary: A fictional account of J.D. Salinger’s early adult life, centered around his wartime service with the CIC including the landing at Utah Beach, fighting in Normandy’s Hedgerows, the interrogation of German captives, the harrowing fighting of Huertgen Forest during the Battle of the Bulge, and the discovery of a Nazi death camp.
J. D. Salinger was one of the more enigmatic and reclusive authors in the twentieth century. Catcher in the Rye and Franny and Zooey are among the most significant novels of the twentieth century and arguably influential on the style of other more recent works. In this work of fiction, that closely follows Salinger’s biography Jerome Charyn explores the impact of World War Two on the trajectory of Salinger’s life between opening and closing scenes in New York.
The work opens with Salinger invited by the debutante Oona O’Neill to join her as Walter Winchell held court at Table 50. At this time he’s completed prep school, has had a few stories published while Oona is serving as eye candy as Winchell hobnobs with the likes of Hemingway. He loves Oona but the war interrupts their relationship. After a tantalizing but unfulfilled last night, she goes to Hollywood while he is drafted and sent to England with the Counter Intelligence Corp while training as a rifleman.
He carries a satchel with a manuscript whose main character is Holden Caulfield and he writes when he can on an old army issue Corona. That is, until the horrors of war interrupt. He witnesses a horrible training accident at Slapton Sands and has to help with the coverup, burying the bodies. He is in the second wave to hit Utah Beach, shepherding his captain, who is shell-shocked to safety. He joins the fighting in the hedgerows of Normandy. He survives the horror of Huertgen Forest in the Battle of the Bulge. He stumbles on a Nazi death camp, unable to get rid of the smell of burning and rotting bodies, and the horror of the walking dead, the few survivors. All of this actually happened to Salinger.
Charyn portrays a Salinger psychologically damaged, needing to check into a psychiatric institute, where he meets and later marries Sylvie, another brief and failed relationship. He feels so damaged, he helps with de-Nazification rather than going home as soon as possible. He’s not lost his humanity, tenderly rescuing and paying for the care of Alicja, a young girl assaulted in the camp, left tongue-less. When he does return, he has episodes of “zoning out” and only with the care of family, especially his sister Dottie does he get to the place where he can write in an apartment on Sleepy Hollow Lane.
Was Salinger a victim of PTSD? That is what Charyn and others who have written of Salinger would have us believe, His daughter Margaret would contend otherwise. But the novel offers a compelling portrayal of a psychologically scarred Salinger, leaving us wonder how things would have been different apart from the war.
Charyn frames the work with two unfulfilled relationships, with Oona and Sylvie. That maps with much of Salinger’s life. His second marriage ended in divorce after eleven years. He had at least two more brief relationships before marrying for the third time in 1988, a marriage that lasted until he passed in 2010.
Finally, we are left wondering what will happen to Holden Caulfield. Will the manuscript in the satchel see the light of day? We know the answer to that, but the end of the novel leaves us wondering what else that Salinger wrote has yet to see daylight. His last published work was in 1965 but he continued writing throughout his life. We’re left wondering whether we’ve seen Salinger’s best.
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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary review copy of this book from the publisher via LibraryThing’s Early Reviewers Program. The opinions I have expressed are my own.
J. D. Salinger was one of the more enigmatic and reclusive authors in the twentieth century. Catcher in the Rye and Franny and Zooey are among the most significant novels of the twentieth century and arguably influential on the style of other more recent works. In this work of fiction, that closely follows Salinger’s biography Jerome Charyn explores the impact of World War Two on the trajectory of Salinger’s life between opening and closing scenes in New York.
The work opens with Salinger invited by the debutante Oona O’Neill to join her as Walter Winchell held court at Table 50. At this time he’s completed prep school, has had a few stories published while Oona is serving as eye candy as Winchell hobnobs with the likes of Hemingway. He loves Oona but the war interrupts their relationship. After a tantalizing but unfulfilled last night, she goes to Hollywood while he is drafted and sent to England with the Counter Intelligence Corp while training as a rifleman.
He carries a satchel with a manuscript whose main character is Holden Caulfield and he writes when he can on an old army issue Corona. That is, until the horrors of war interrupt. He witnesses a horrible training accident at Slapton Sands and has to help with the coverup, burying the bodies. He is in the second wave to hit Utah Beach, shepherding his captain, who is shell-shocked to safety. He joins the fighting in the hedgerows of Normandy. He survives the horror of Huertgen Forest in the Battle of the Bulge. He stumbles on a Nazi death camp, unable to get rid of the smell of burning and rotting bodies, and the horror of the walking dead, the few survivors. All of this actually happened to Salinger.
Charyn portrays a Salinger psychologically damaged, needing to check into a psychiatric institute, where he meets and later marries Sylvie, another brief and failed relationship. He feels so damaged, he helps with de-Nazification rather than going home as soon as possible. He’s not lost his humanity, tenderly rescuing and paying for the care of Alicja, a young girl assaulted in the camp, left tongue-less. When he does return, he has episodes of “zoning out” and only with the care of family, especially his sister Dottie does he get to the place where he can write in an apartment on Sleepy Hollow Lane.
Was Salinger a victim of PTSD? That is what Charyn and others who have written of Salinger would have us believe, His daughter Margaret would contend otherwise. But the novel offers a compelling portrayal of a psychologically scarred Salinger, leaving us wonder how things would have been different apart from the war.
Charyn frames the work with two unfulfilled relationships, with Oona and Sylvie. That maps with much of Salinger’s life. His second marriage ended in divorce after eleven years. He had at least two more brief relationships before marrying for the third time in 1988, a marriage that lasted until he passed in 2010.
Finally, we are left wondering what will happen to Holden Caulfield. Will the manuscript in the satchel see the light of day? We know the answer to that, but the end of the novel leaves us wondering what else that Salinger wrote has yet to see daylight. His last published work was in 1965 but he continued writing throughout his life. We’re left wondering whether we’ve seen Salinger’s best.
________________________________
Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary review copy of this book from the publisher via LibraryThing’s Early Reviewers Program. The opinions I have expressed are my own.
January 31, 2021
Charyn finds little mystery in the famously mysterious J.D. Salinger. He makes a persuasive case for the reclusive author suffering from a wartime case of what we refer to today as PTSD. He further suggests that Salinger’s wartime exploits should have equipped him to write the quintessential war novel (e.g., “The Naked and the Dead” or “Catch 22”). Instead, the disillusioned Salinger turned his focus inward, possibly because of the horrors he may have seen, and the forced moral conflicts required by his assignment to counterintelligence. Charyn admirably evokes the horror and ambiguity with Salinger’s ordered cover-up of the Slapton Sounds fiasco, his decisions, contrary to orders, to protect friends and connected Nazis, his rescue of a sexually abused child from a death camp, his amorous escapades with the German doctor/spy, Silvia Welter, and especially his postwar self-commitment to a mental hospital.
Notwithstanding the cultlike status he enjoyed from his “Holden Caulfield novel”, Salinger’s failure to leave much of a footprint leaves Charyn with little more to work with than speculation built on the historical record. Although Charyn’s depiction of Salinger’s coming-of-age is quite poignant, his fictional exploits seem improbable. Why place Salinger at every big event in the European theater (Utah Beach on D-Day, the deliverance of Paris, the Battle of the Bulge, and the liberation of the death camp at Dachau)? Similarly, why include celebrities like Walter Winchell, Earnest Hemingway, Frank Costello, and Eugene O’Neill’s daughter? All of this seems gratuitous and only suggests that the story may be too contrived to be believable. What is missing is the internal life that a retelling of the historical record, no matter how personalized, simply can’t provide.
With this being said, Charyns treatment of the Salinger family is loving, humorous, and entirely believable. Despite her not being Jewish, his mother, Miriam, is the classic Jewish mother. She is a lovable mixture of kvetching and caring, sending wool socks with every mailing while complaining about his war bride. His father, Sol’s focus is primarily business. Although undoubtedly true, the importation of ham by a Jewish businessman seems farfetched. Salinger’s sister, Doris, is the most likeable family member. She is a protective and loving older sibling, who takes charge at all the right moments.
Despite its flaws, SERGEANT SALINGER is an engaging story that raises intriguing suggestions about the hypothetical birth of one of our most cherished coming-of-age stories of youthful disillusionment.
Notwithstanding the cultlike status he enjoyed from his “Holden Caulfield novel”, Salinger’s failure to leave much of a footprint leaves Charyn with little more to work with than speculation built on the historical record. Although Charyn’s depiction of Salinger’s coming-of-age is quite poignant, his fictional exploits seem improbable. Why place Salinger at every big event in the European theater (Utah Beach on D-Day, the deliverance of Paris, the Battle of the Bulge, and the liberation of the death camp at Dachau)? Similarly, why include celebrities like Walter Winchell, Earnest Hemingway, Frank Costello, and Eugene O’Neill’s daughter? All of this seems gratuitous and only suggests that the story may be too contrived to be believable. What is missing is the internal life that a retelling of the historical record, no matter how personalized, simply can’t provide.
With this being said, Charyns treatment of the Salinger family is loving, humorous, and entirely believable. Despite her not being Jewish, his mother, Miriam, is the classic Jewish mother. She is a lovable mixture of kvetching and caring, sending wool socks with every mailing while complaining about his war bride. His father, Sol’s focus is primarily business. Although undoubtedly true, the importation of ham by a Jewish businessman seems farfetched. Salinger’s sister, Doris, is the most likeable family member. She is a protective and loving older sibling, who takes charge at all the right moments.
Despite its flaws, SERGEANT SALINGER is an engaging story that raises intriguing suggestions about the hypothetical birth of one of our most cherished coming-of-age stories of youthful disillusionment.
October 31, 2022
The author follows the footsteps of J.D. Salinger during the time he was in the U. S. Army. Sergeant Salinger participated in training and military exercises leading up to D-Day and afterwards and had a chance meeting with General Theodore Roosevelt on the sands of Utah Beach. (Who knew that the ex-president landed in the first waves onto French soil on D-Day?) His duties include interrogating
villagers as well as captured Nazi soldiers and SS troops as his unit pushes enemy forces back and moves onward. The author provides a historically researched and accurate description of the D-Day invasion from the vantage point of a participating ground soldier. The Sergeant’s unit advances, and links up with airborne forces who arrived from a different direction, civilian refugees, and later with war correspondent Ernest Hemingway after they reach Paris. The narrative continues through the discovery of death camps and other evils left behind by the Nazi forces. The author treats it all in a gripping manner and continues to follow Sergeant Salinger returning to civilian life with what today we would call PTSD. This was my first reading of a book by Jerome Charyn – and is such excellent historical fiction that my next read will be his narrative fiction on Theodore Roosevelt and his times.
villagers as well as captured Nazi soldiers and SS troops as his unit pushes enemy forces back and moves onward. The author provides a historically researched and accurate description of the D-Day invasion from the vantage point of a participating ground soldier. The Sergeant’s unit advances, and links up with airborne forces who arrived from a different direction, civilian refugees, and later with war correspondent Ernest Hemingway after they reach Paris. The narrative continues through the discovery of death camps and other evils left behind by the Nazi forces. The author treats it all in a gripping manner and continues to follow Sergeant Salinger returning to civilian life with what today we would call PTSD. This was my first reading of a book by Jerome Charyn – and is such excellent historical fiction that my next read will be his narrative fiction on Theodore Roosevelt and his times.
February 13, 2021
I thought this book an honest telling of the worst horrors of WWII. I only read it as I was interested in the background of J D Salinger. In retrospect he must have been the coolest character ever to survive first of all and to then write all that he did. Hemingway was an idol of his and he carried copies of his works to hand out to Hem's fans while he was in England. Before the war, he had gone to the private back room of the Stork Club with his love Oona. That scene was a writer's paradise. He met Walter Winchell there and later worked for him. Also had a conversation with Hemingway. What history is told here!
Being a counter intelligence officer in England did not garner him any friends except for his chauffeur. They did wild things. He never stopped loving Oona,but she moved on.
This is a man's story, especially those who understand maneuvers and battles. I was shocked to learn about a training session that happened when I was 10 years old. The massacre at Slapton Sands in Devon in 1944 shortly after Ike had appeared on scene. It was completely covered up because it was a precursor to the attack on Omaha Beach. Now there are memorials there.
I will probably finish the book, skipping over the worst of the horrible. Read it if you have a strong stomach.
Being a counter intelligence officer in England did not garner him any friends except for his chauffeur. They did wild things. He never stopped loving Oona,but she moved on.
This is a man's story, especially those who understand maneuvers and battles. I was shocked to learn about a training session that happened when I was 10 years old. The massacre at Slapton Sands in Devon in 1944 shortly after Ike had appeared on scene. It was completely covered up because it was a precursor to the attack on Omaha Beach. Now there are memorials there.
I will probably finish the book, skipping over the worst of the horrible. Read it if you have a strong stomach.
October 5, 2021
Thanks to No Exit Press for the advanced copy of this title in return for an honest review.
Surprisingly, I’ve not read any of Charyn’s previous work, but from what I’ve seen, he is a literary force to be reckoned with. Combine that with JD Salinger and you’ve got the recipe for an excellent book.
This gives a fictional look into, not only JD Salinger, but names like Ernest Hemingway, Oona O’Neill, Walter Winchell, Charlie Chaplin, and Theodore Roosevelt Jr. Whilst I am aware it is a fictionalised account, it reads as truth, and you can see how Salinger’s time in the war would affect his writings. There’s a tremendous amount of research gone into this to ensure the fiction is backed up by the facts and true events.
It must be difficult to write about World War 2 in a unique way - as sad as it seems, nothing shocks us now, we’ve heard it all. But by using a point of view of the well-loved character of Salinger, Charyn gives a more personal insight into the fighting, and the aftermath.
The middle 50-60% of the book is focussed on the actual war, and as much as that made for interesting reading and I enjoyed it, I actually preferred the chapters before and after, giving a real sense of the innocent Salinger as well as how the war affected him as a person and a writer.
Surprisingly, I’ve not read any of Charyn’s previous work, but from what I’ve seen, he is a literary force to be reckoned with. Combine that with JD Salinger and you’ve got the recipe for an excellent book.
This gives a fictional look into, not only JD Salinger, but names like Ernest Hemingway, Oona O’Neill, Walter Winchell, Charlie Chaplin, and Theodore Roosevelt Jr. Whilst I am aware it is a fictionalised account, it reads as truth, and you can see how Salinger’s time in the war would affect his writings. There’s a tremendous amount of research gone into this to ensure the fiction is backed up by the facts and true events.
It must be difficult to write about World War 2 in a unique way - as sad as it seems, nothing shocks us now, we’ve heard it all. But by using a point of view of the well-loved character of Salinger, Charyn gives a more personal insight into the fighting, and the aftermath.
The middle 50-60% of the book is focussed on the actual war, and as much as that made for interesting reading and I enjoyed it, I actually preferred the chapters before and after, giving a real sense of the innocent Salinger as well as how the war affected him as a person and a writer.
March 12, 2021
Novels based on true stories: there are several ways these can be written. One is to create characters who borrow from the experience of real people, but who are definitely fictional. Another is to treat a real person as a character and write a fictionalized version of a biography or memoir. Two recent novels offer versions of both types of novels. While “Newark Minutemen” by Leslie Barry (Morgan James Publishing) features several real life characters, its main protagonists are only loosely based on real people. “Sargeant Salinger” by Jerome Charyn (Bellevue Literary Press), on the other hand, imagines the experiences and thoughts of J. D. Salinger before the writer became famous. Both novels take place before and during World War II, although Barry concentrates on events in the U.S. while the majority of Charyn’s work focuses on events in England and the European continent.
See the rest of my review at https://www.thereportergroup.org/past...
See the rest of my review at https://www.thereportergroup.org/past...
June 16, 2021
“Sergeant Salinger,” by Jerome Charyn (Bellevue, 2021). This is a charged, incisive, brilliant, fictionalized account of J. D. Salinger’s experiences during World War II, from an encounter with Walter Winchell, Ernest Hemingway, and Oona O’Neil at the Stork Club before he is drafted through the Slapton Sands training disaster, landing in the second wave at Utah Beach on D Day, the Battle of the Bulge, Hurtgen Forest, to his time in a psychiatric ward and then back home to the Salingers on Park Avenue. There is so much packed into the story that I found it hard to believe until checking on Salinger’s actual wartime experience---and it’s all there! Charnow imagines the dialogue and Salinger’s internal life as he tries to navigate all the absurd and awful things he went through. AlI of it, of course, went into those many stories and Catcher in the Rye. It kept reminding me of Catch-22 and Slaughterhouse Five, though those were fictionalized autobiography. A very quick read.
http://www.jeromecharyn.com/home.htm
http://www.jeromecharyn.com/home.htm
April 9, 2021
A novel that imagines the inner life of someone as essentially unknowable as JD Salinger is always going to disappoint. How can any writer, even one as talented as Mr Charyn, , ever do justice to the character of Salinger, created in our own minds from his writing and shards of biographical detail? Whilst I loved the evocation of 40’s New York, with Hemingway and the ghost of Fitzgerald slipping through the pages, the end result never had a chance to match the version of Salinger I’ve nurtured and lived with all my life. Don’t get me wrong, this novel is worth your time and attention. Just don’t expect any genuine unravelling of the Salinger soul, nor the quirky, gravitational pull of his prose.
April 14, 2021
Those of us who respect and admire J.D. Salinger as a writer know that his life was not typical for someone who had made a rocky but successful venture into publication with his novel The Catcher in the Rye. Drafted into WWII as a very young man, he saw too much horror and it scarred him. With a deft hand, Charyn tells us a fictionalized story about Salinger’s life during and after the war. Sergeant Salinger is a gift for anyone who would like to know more about the author who made Holden Caulfield a classroom name and a bestseller for everyone to enjoy. If you feel about Salinger as I do, I hope you will visit the pages of this insightful novel if for no other reason than to enjoy a great story.
I met this book at Auntie's Bookstore in Spokane, WA
I met this book at Auntie's Bookstore in Spokane, WA
July 14, 2021
The author does a great job of transporting me back to this period in history. I like that Charlie Chapin's daughter, Oona is a character. This is the time of censorship, the so-called "Red Scare" & after effects of WW2. I read "The Catcher in the Rye" when I was in HS and I didn't relate to it. The reasons was because I was a black girl growing up in NYC, dealing with racism, sexism and poverty on a daily basis. I didn't feel very sympathic to Holden. I did like Salinger's, "Nine Stories" better. Despite this, I enjoyed this telling of young Jerry trying to navigate his way of being an artist during these changing times. Two years ago I saw the original typed manuscript at an exhibit at TE NYPL.
March 2, 2021
This novel is based on fact. The author has built a story on a young J.D. Salinger and his love for Oona O’Neill, his time in the army in counterintelligence and his life when he got home. Since Salinger was a somewhat a recluse, it was interesting how the author got to portray him. I found myself going online to check the facts and was pleasantly surprised to learn that they were true. It deal a lot with the horrors of war and what life was like back then. The characters were interesting and some parts were more interesting to me than others.
September 11, 2022
I've always been curious about J.D. Salinger, not only as an author but also a person. This book, rooted in truths, explores his immediate family, personal life and time serving in WWII, including the possible effects of each on him over time, especially his writing career. Showing early promise and success as a young adult writer, it is likely many expected more high quality writing from him. This book mostly details his war service. If you find military history dull, this book may not be appealing. I've not read Catcher In The Rye or his other works, but plan to sometime.
March 26, 2021
3.5. Well written fictional account of JD Salinger’s war experience. I was fascinated by the war stories, but I felt the novel was weak when describing Salinger’s return home. I was hoping for more clarity and understanding of how he both regained his writing and how his eccentricities took over his life.
March 29, 2021
A thoughtful, tense, pulsating look at the reclusive author J.D Salinger during World War II. My personal favorite is definitely the chapter set in the Stork Club, all of the people involved Salinger, Oona O’Neill, Frank Costello, Herman Melville, and the grand master of the scene Walter Winchell. I would love to read an entire book on just that.
Free review copy.
Free review copy.
April 27, 2021
This book reads as a historical/biographical novel based around a segment of JD Salinger’s life. As such it’s very detailed and I think accurate, but I don’t get a clear picture of Salinger himself. I miss the voice of his as it appears in his own writings. Other than that it’s well-written and well worth the time spent.
August 4, 2021
I both appreciated and was disappointed by the way this book subverted my expectations. Charyn does not give too many obvious nods to Salinger, so that the book does not come off as hammy. However, it almost felt as the Sonny of the book could have been any soldier. I didn't feel like I got to know/learned anything about Salinger.
July 9, 2022
Clearly Charyn loves Salinger, and just as clearly Charyn knows the world of WWII. I read this at the same time as Franny and Zooey, and I'm afraid Charyn isn't as vivid a writer as Salinger. The first half feels somehow flat, for all its details. The second half begins to develop some guts. A labor of love.
March 6, 2021
Excellent integration of fact and fiction to produce a compelling novel centered around J.D. Salinger.
Lots to absorb - life in Manhattan during the 40s with celebrities and gangsters, the horrors of war from Utah Beach to Nuremberg. Impressive writing with excellent dialogue and descriptors.
Lots to absorb - life in Manhattan during the 40s with celebrities and gangsters, the horrors of war from Utah Beach to Nuremberg. Impressive writing with excellent dialogue and descriptors.
May 9, 2021
Thoroughly engrossing. Inspired me to want (as so many before) to better understand what Salinger never cared to share. Could not wait to return to its pages, and when I was done, I fished out Catcher for my first re-read in decades.
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