Product Description

To each other's regret, both Marshall and Joyce survived 9/11. But it looks unlikely that they will survive the apparently endless war of their divorce. Both refuse to move out of the apartment, on their lawyers' orders, and neither is above using the children as footsoldiers in their battle. They will use any psychological weapon that comes to hand - sex; money; friends; relations - to gain an advantage that might prove decisive. As the months pass the domestic skirmishes begin to echo the international. In both theatres of war, events are becoming crazier, but people tend to break before nations do. Ken Kalfus's new novel is a brilliantly insightful and compelling portrait of what our modern state of perpetual war does on the home front.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #500356 in Books
• Published on: 2007-07-02
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

JONATHAN FRANZEN
'Wry, humane, precise and beautifully smitten with ideas'

Book of the Week, THE TIMES
'Absorbing, intelligent, witty and wry'

FINANCIAL TIMES 19/8
'Kalfus' talent for description is undeniable. His portrayal of
the collapse of the towers... is utterly enthralling'

Customer Reviews

Refreshingly improper
As a Brit who lives in the US, I have to say that I found this novel incredibly refreshing given the tremendously sensitive climate here. What Kalfus does is brave - he makes us laugh at things that are unpleasant and uncomfortable, and in doing so he deflates much of the fear and outrage that still ring with us from 2001. He takes a very human story - a divorce gone bad - and places it in the context of American tragedy and paranoia. It works, for the most part. I do disagree with the reviewer here who says that Kalfus didn't know how to end the book. Yes, the ending is strange and disconcerting, but it is meant to be. The scenes at the end yank us back and remind us of what a cancelled flight and a delay getting to work can do to lives. Chance and different decisions, even in the face of terrible events, can make our lives change in unexpected ways and give us new hope. If only more writers would be so brave.

"A novel that marries the political and the personal to create a story about divorce."
Ken Kelfus's A Disorder Peculiar to the Country takes its name from Oliver Goldsmith's quote: "There is a disorder peculiar to the country, which every season makes strange ravages among them." Since this quote makes mention of the seasons, it can be no coincidence that Kalfus has chosen to write the novel chronologically, month after month, thus pulling the reader into a story which is told in a way which reflects the changing of the seasons.

He begins the novel with the character of Joyce on the roof of her New York office on September 11th, watching the World Trade Center in flames, plumes of black smoke billowing, secretly feeling "a pang of pleasure" deep within herself when she watches the towers collapse. We soon discover the reason for her elation is that her husband Marshall works in the World Trade Center, so Joyce suspects, rather sadistically, that he might be dead.

As it transpires, Marshall survived 9/11, but Joyce's hatred of him (and their hatred of each other) continues. Both characters have been locked in a long and bitter divorce where, due to a legal wrangling, they have been forced to live together because neither one of them wants to give up their apartment. This clearly establishes the two main characters' seething dislike for each other, and from Sept. 11 onwards, the novel explores both of their lives as they await their divorce hearing, mirroring each turbulent event with the social and political aftermath of 9/11 (i.e. during the Anthrax attacks in NYC, Joyce informs the FBI that she suspects Marshall is responsible, and later, while walking through the city, Marshall imagines a suicide bomb attack in vivid detail).

Since the novel is narrated omnisciently, Kalfus allows both characters to convey to the reader their inner exploration along the way - and as both characters attempt to search for answers within themselves, the whole of society's search for truth and meaning post-9/11 takes on a much deeper resonance. This use of omniscient narration humanizes both characters, since it displays their inner humanity, their conscience, and also puts some of New York's political and social anxieties into context.

In simple terms then, A Disorder Peculiar to the Country is probably best described as a novel that marries the political and the personal to create a story about divorce. And as far as the subject of identity is concerned, the political or social disarray Marshall and Joyce witness bears some relation to their perception about themselves, each other and, more importantly perhaps, their divorce.

Neither terribly interesting nor terribly funny
Marshall and Joyce live and work in New York and are fighting fiercely about their divorce. When on 9 September 2001 two planes hit the WTC, Joyce thinks that Marshall is dead because he works in the WTC and Marshall presumes Joyce dead as she was supposed to be on the United flight. But both miraculously escape and their war continues. Both have greedy attorneys that try to make the most of the situation and both try to come up with ways to hurt the other. But deep down inside they do not like all this bitter fighting.

This book is supposed to be "intelligent and witty", but I found it to have a rather mediocre storyline and a not very creatively funny plot. Yes, it is funny when the husband tries to ruin the stock portfolio of his wife by buying only down-the-drain stocks, only to find out that she is making even more money due to the twists and turns of fate, but it is not terribly inventive. And the wife seducing a mutual friend is also not terribly creative. All in all a rather mediocre book in which the 9/11 theme could have been explored more creatively. A very thin 3 stars.