"America America" the beautiful

We're only halfway through 2008, but I'll be surprised if Ethan Canin's America America doesn't make my list of top 10 books of the year. I've always thought of Canin as a short story writer - I may have mentioned fifty times or so that Emperor of the Air is one of my favorite collections, with the title story ranking as one of my favorites ever - but America America is a grand novel, with a wide scope and small anguishes, about a young man from a working class family in the '70s who gets embroiled with a wealthy and powerful family with political aspirations.

The writing is exquisite, the depiction of the fading days of a certain American dream haunting. And it's funny how Canin reminds us that even as things shift in American politics, they stay the same (I'm thinking of Muskie blowing his shot at the Democratic nomination for crying on TV; ring a bell, Howard Dean?)

I love when I respond to a book on an intellectual level and an emotional one, and America America wrings admiration from me on both. And I will finally stop thinking of Canin as a short story writer. The fact that I do is silly: he's written three other novels besides this one.

Canin appears at 5 p.m. July 13 (a Sunday) at Books & Books, and if I weren't going to be on the other side of the country that day you can bet I'd be there. And you can read my review of the book either way.