Goldman’s snappy dialogue and light touch make this sendup of West Coast superficiality, East Coast academia, and the Old Testament an entertaining read full of weighty, nuanced questions about faith, fate, and what makes life precious, even after four millennia.
. . . Publishers Weekly
A lively, inventive tale of Isaac that follows him beyond Genesis into the 21st century.
After being spared from Abraham's blade, he's been granted eternal youth and wanders the earth as a soldier of fortune. Turning up at a coffee shop in Los Angeles, he falls in love with Ruby Canby, a brilliant, breezy academic with a troubled past.
Isaac suspects he was forgotten, "a crumb dropped innoticed in a kitchen crevice." Perhaps whatever saved him is long gone, leaving him "a puppet without a puppet master, like one of those Japanese soldiers stranded on an island after World War II."
Isaac and Ruth must ultimately confront a sinister, enigmatic phantom that's stalked him for forty centuries. The story makes stops that include the Spanish Inquisition, a luxury box at the Super Bowl, and the infamous cells of the Tombs of New York City. Along the way it takes stock of time and chance, good and evil, faith, forgiveness, God Satan, and the power of everlasting love.
Goldman’s snappy dialogue and light touch make this sendup of West Coast superficiality, East Coast academia, and the Old Testament an entertaining read full of weighty, nuanced questions about faith, fate, and what makes life precious, even after four millennia. -- Publishers Weekly
New York Times-best-selling author Ivan Goldman's work has appeared inThe Nation, Rolling Stone, Columbia Journalism Review, Utne Reader, The Ring, The New York Times, and The Washington Post. Isaac: a Modern Fable is his fourth novel. He and his wife live in Southern California.
Professional Reviews
Publishers Weekly
Isaac: A Modern Fable
Ivan G. Goldman. Permanent, $28 (222p) ISBN 978-1-5796-2229-9
In this fast-paced mashup of Faust and the biblical story of Isaac, former Los Angeles Times reporter Goldman (The Barfighter) twists the screws on a pair of star-crossed lovers as they struggle to overcome the natural and supernatural forces keeping them apart. When clever, gorgeous professor Ruth Canby meets handsome muscle-for-hire Lenny at the L.A. Farmers Market, their mutual attraction overpowers Ruth’s inhibitions. But mysterious Lenny, who is, in fact, Isaac, son of Abraham, physically young after 4,000 years and world-weary but still in love with life—throws her over to protect his secret. Hurt and disappointed, Ruth accepts a too-good-to-be-true offer to join a Columbia University think tank and tries to forget Lenny, while fending off a colleague’s advances. Back in L.A., Lenny avoids his age-old nemesis “The Beast” and attempts to forget Ruth. But he discovers that she’s in grave danger, and only a supreme sacrifice might save her. Goldman’s snappy dialogue and light touch make this sendup of West Coast superficiality, East Coast academia, and the Old Testament an entertaining read full of weighty, nuanced questions about faith, fate, and what makes life precious, even after four millennia. (Apr.)
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