NEW YORK: THE NOVEL

NEW YORK:  THE NOVEL by Edward Rutherford was read for the Chunkster Challenge 2011.

From Amazon.com:

Edward Rutherford celebrates America's greatest city in a rich, engrossing saga, weaving together tales of families rich and poor, native-born and immigrant - a cast of fictional and true characters whose fates rise and fall and rise again with the city's fortunes.  From this intimate perspective we see New York's humble beginnings as a tiny Indian fishing village, the arrival of Dutch and British merchants, the Revolutionary War, the emergence of the city as a great trading and financial center, the convulsions of the Civil War, the excesses of the Gilded Age, the explosion of immigration in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the trials of World War II, the near demise of New York in the 1970s and its roaring rebirth in the 1990s, and the attack on the World Trade Center.  A stirring mix of battle, romance, family struggles, and personal triumphs, NEW YORK:  THE NOVEL gloriously captures the search for freedom and opportunity at the heart of our nation's history.

I love New York City.  I think it's one of the most interesting places I've visited.  The hustle and bustle, the different and distinct neighborhoods, the beauty of the buildings and Central Park, the people from all walks of life - there's always something going on.  I was so excited to read this book.  But, unfortunately, I found the book to be a disappointment.

The story follows one family through the history of New York from the early Dutch settlement to present day New York.  This family, the Masters, are a wealthy group and their story is told from the point of view of the upper class.  Other families are introduced to bring in the stories of the different nationalities settling in New York - the Germans, the Irish and the Italians - as needed to detail certain events such as the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire and the beginnings of organized crime.

I would have liked to have read more about the city itself, including all five boroughs, not just centered on Manhattan and Brooklyn.  Where were the stories of Yonkers, of Queens, of the Bronx?  Giving the author the benefit of the doubt, I'm assuming that there was no way to tell a complete history of New York and all its people in one book.  There is so much in New York's story that could have been told but wasn't as it didn't fit in with the lives of the Master family.

Large periods of time were jumped over and characters disappeared without an explanation of what had happened during those years.  Historic events such as the stock market crash of 1929 were glossed over in a few pages.

As this is the first book of his that I read, I'm not familiar with his writing style.  I felt the writing to be too cut and dry.  There were no vivid descriptions of the city or the people.  The style was more "he said, she said" with no indication of the thoughts of the people involved.  I never formed a connection with any of the characters and didn't really care what happened to them.

I kept hoping for more, but the book offered less and less as the story continued.  Mr. Rutherford has written two books about Ireland, but at this time, I don't think I'll bother reading them.