A World Away

Starred review from June 1, 1998
Granta-listed O'Nan (Snow Angels) fulfills his promise with this affecting and nuanced examination of family alliances tested by infidelity, illness and the pervasive impact of WWII. James Langer, repentant over an affair with one of his high-school students, tries to reconcile himself with his wife, Anne, who responds with silence, fury and a lover of her own. Some rapprochement seems less possible yet all the more necessary as the strain on the marriage increases. As the novel opens, the couple and their tepidly unhappy adolescent son, Jay, have come to the Hamptons to care for James's father, felled by a stroke. Yet the wound that runs deepest is the uncertain fate of their older son, Rennie, a former conscientious objector who became a medic and is now missing in action in the Pacific. The potential for melodrama increases as Rennie's wife, Dorothy, joins the family in the Hamptons after giving birth to their child. Yet O'Nan avoids that pitfall by focusing on the continually shifting tensions and alliances that animate the family: Anne's ambivalence about forgiving her husband; James's anxieties about the damaged family around him; and young Jay's growing confidence as he cares for his ailing grandfather. The narrative's subtle balance falters a bit with Rennie's homecoming; frustratingly, O'Nan holds the returned soldier somewhat aloof from the reader, rigorously keeping the focus on James and Ann. Still, this is a compassionate, acutely observant and deftly understated novel that evokes the longings that tug at one's heart as it unfurls in elegant prose. 30,000 first printing; author tour.

May 1, 1998
The Langer family, suffering during World War II from the emotional and physical fallout of infidelity, terminal illness, and combat injuries, moves back to the rundown home of the dying Langer grandfather, resigned to their misery yet hoping for a miracle of recovery. Ann Langer, bitter over husband James's recent affair with one of his high school students and mortified by son Rennie's conscientious objector status, barely speaks to the former and refuses to write to the latter, who is serving as a medic in the Aleutian Islands. Trained as a nurse, Anne finds both dispassionate solace tending to the needs of her father-in-law and passionate escape in the arms of a soldier stationed nearby. The Langers' young son Jay is tortured by his brother's absence, his grandfather's illness, and the raw disintegration of his parents' marriage. Enter Rennie's wife and newborn daughter and later Rennie himself, an injured wreck of his former self. Extraordinary for his sensitive climb into the minds and hearts of his characters, especially the deeply flawed Anne, O'Nan (Snow Angels, LJ 11/15/94) stuns his readers with his sudden dips in time, creating a compelling rhythm of power and frailty against an onslaught of hurt. Beautifully done.--Beth E. Andersen, Ann Arbor Dist. Lib., MI

May 1, 1998
In a sluggish novel from a usually compelling author, domestic tensions on the home front during World War II are at the center. O'Nan's specific focus is the shaky marriage of James and Anne, whose son, Rennie, is missing in action overseas. James has had an affair with a student; Anne turns the tables and has a liaison with a soldier stationed locally. James and Anne's recovery as a married couple is taking considerable time. Meanwhile, Rennie's wife faces childbirth without him; when he does return from battle, they must reacquaint themselves. With their family together again and growing, James and Anne, now more than ever, must find new grounding to secure their marriage. For all its luscious detail and careful attention to language, or perhaps "because" of those two factors, the novel remains stiff. The characters' plights seem real but, at the same time, seem recycled from many other wartime novels and even movies. Still, O'Nan is gathering a substantial readership, so expect demand for his latest. ((Reviewed May 1, 1998))(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 1998, American Library Association.)