Freddy and Fredericka

May 9, 2005
Though it is hard to be a king, it is harder yet to become one," begins this wildly imaginative, adventure-filled, clever—and also overlong and self-indulgent—parody of a future king and queen of England, who are dead ringers for Charles and Diana. Freddy lacks the charisma and royal presence that would qualify him for kingship (in spite of his intelligence and book smarts), so he and his gorgeous but dumb wife, Fredericka, are packed off to a savage land—America—where Freddy must fulfill a mysterious quest in order to achieve his destiny. Helprin (The Pacific and Other Stories
, etc.) plays out his zany plot on a grand scale, attempting a satiric critique of modern English and American society. The narrative is loaded with witty philosophical asides about the folly of human nature and of the governments people elect or endure. When the dorky prince and his ditsy wife arrive incognito in America, parachuting naked into New Jersey, they embark on a series of screwball adventures that take them from coast to coast. Most momentously, Freddy finds himself a secret adviser to an egregiously stupid presidential candidate. Rarely does the narrative shimmer with the lyricism that distinguishes Helprin's best work, but readers can have fun with this book, which is probably all Helprin intended. Agent, Wendy Weil Agency. Author tour.

May 1, 2005
Helprin's expansive, kitchen-sink fiction ("Memoir from Antproof Case", "A Soldier of the Great War") is often marked by the occasional madcap flight of fancy, but his latest is a full-out farce and a fable of epic proportions. Freddy, the Prince of Wales, is a stiff intellectual, while his beautiful wife, Princess Fredericka, lives for public adoration. To save the monarchy from an all-consuming media circus, these thinly veiled versions of Prince Charles and Princess Diana are sent on a mission; they're kicked out of the palace and literally dropped from a plane into New Jersey. To avoid the limelight while wandering America, they must live as destitute tramps and find themselves tossed into myriad strange situations. But, remarkably, through their hardscrabble existence they find themselves drawn closer together than ever before. While Helprin often succumbs to cheap-shot lampooning humor, his prose never flags; there is a regal quality to his writing in anything that he undertakes. Still, the novel is a disappointment. It feels more like an empty exercise or a stop-gap for Helprin, lacking the emotional depth of his earlier work. Recommended for public libraries. [See Prepub Alert, "LJ "3/15/05.] -Misha Stone, Seattle P.L.

Copyright 2005 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

April 15, 2005
Helprin generates a delectable tension between his impeccable style and unbridled imagination in tales that careen from precise realism to exalted romantic fantasy. His first novel in a decade, following the sumptuous " The Pacific and Other Stories " [BKL O 1 04], is a satirical, picaresque romp that makes shrewd, gleeful fun of the British monarchy and the American presidential campaign. Freddy, the Prince of Wales, is an outdoorsy, erudite, large-eared, and well-meaning man, but he is also hapless, falling repeatedly into ludicrous situations that delight the rapacious press and give fits to his mother the queen and his eccentric father. And Fredericka, Freddy's blond, buxom, camera-loving, seemingly vapid wife, doesn't help. Finally, after a series of vaudevillian mishaps, Freddy and Fredericka are sent incognito to America to redeem themselves. Their mission impossible? Reconquer the colony. After parachuting into the industrial wasteland of New Jersey and stealing a motorcycle from a Hell's Angel, the two intrepid royals, a bit worse for wear, head west, riding freight trains, posing as dentists, and serving as forest fire lookouts until Freddy very nearly secures a cabinet position. Replete with slapstick and hilarious linguistic misunderstandings, this intermittently verbose yet irresistibly mischievous fable draws freely on Don Quixote, Mark Twain, Monty Python, and Jerzy Kosinski's " Being There" , yet is in the end pure Helprin in its narrative agility and celebration of nature's glory and human kindness, courage, and love. (Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2005, American Library Association.)