Scott Nadelson

Scott Nadelson's very 'literary' and deeply personal memoir, THE NEXT SCOTT NADELSON, is in one way a kind of 'one-trick pony.' Nadelson is a young aspiring writer, transplanted from his Jewish solidly upper middle-class New Jersey upbringing to Portland, Oregon. The central motif of his memoir is repeated over and over until you just wanna say: OKAY! I GET it! You were JILTed! And your 'ex-fiancee' (a label manifestly overused, I assume to protect her actually identity) was a manipulative confused bisexual! (And maybe a bit of the other B-word too.) Yeah, that's the overriding theme here, that and how he gradually overcame this traumatic ego-crushing event and got his life back together. Because there is, it seems to me, a surfeit of self-pity followed by some subtly self-congratulatory patting himself on the back. "There, there, Scott. You've gotten through this very bad time in your life. Now you can get on with the rest of it."

Okay. Got that off my chest. That said, I quite enjoyed this memoir, it's title stemming from the fact that apparently several reviewers of his first book of stories, SAVING STANLEY (a book I absolutely loved), called him "the next Philip Roth." Which sounds pretty cool to me, but became, after a time, rather discouraging to Nadelson, given the initially poor showings at his talks and book signings and dismal sales.

The best part of Nadelson's story is his self-effacing sense of humor (often overshadowed, unfortunately, by his self-pity). And I loved the section dealing with a period when he worked for a Portland "literary nonprofit" and his meetings with playwright Edward Albee and novelist Edna O'Brien, of whom Albee warned, "She's quite mad, you know." O'Brien (who was indeed quite eccentric) called Albee "a lovely man."

I also found interesting Nadelson's eclectic tastes in books and music - Malouf, Schopenhauer, Wallace Stevens, Kafka, Babel, Dylan Thomas in books; Dylan, Eric Dolphy, and (particularly) Townes Van Zandt in music. This aspect of his story brought to mind another excellent memoir I read not long ago, Sven Birkerts' MY SKY BLUE TRADES.

There are also a couple of funny-poignant chapters on a pre-pubescent summer camp experience and a high school scavenger hunt. The fact is this book is a highly entertaining read, providing valuable insights into the life of a young writer who may very well earn that early accolade of being "the next Philip Roth." He's got the time, and he certainly has the talent. I for one hope he sticks with it, because I want to read more Scott Nadelson. There are two story collections I have not yet read which I plan to seek out soon. In the meantime, I will say to young Mr Nadelson: "Do not despair, Scott. Please, keep on writing."… (mais)

Scott Nadelson's SAVING STANLEY is, hands down, one of the best damn books I have read in a long time, and I read a lot of books, many of them VERY good. This one, though, well, it was a pure joy to read. Nadelson is a young writer in total command of his craft.

Subtitled THE BRICKMAN STORIES, Nadelson's book might be found shelved with short story collections, and, while it's true there are eight distinct stories here, taken together they tell the story of one family, i.e. the Brickmans of northern New Jersey. The central character of these interrelated stories is Daniel Brickman, the second son of Arthur and Hannah (Collins, changed from Kollechelnik) Brickman. Daniel's story is the most complete, presenting him, in non-chronological order, from boyhood and adolescence ("Mr. Mervin", "With Equals Alone" and "Saving Stanley") into struggling adulthood ("Young Radicals" and "Kosher"). Son Jared, four years older than Daniel, gets his own story in "Anything You Need." Mother Hannah takes center stage in "Saving Stanley" but also figures prominently in "Hannah of Troy." Father Arthur, a scientist, is the featured player in "Why Not?". Even Daniel's Russian Jewish immigrant grandfather, Murray Collins, gets a part (in "Young Radicals"). In the end, though, all of these perfectly realized stories blend seamlessly together to give you the story of an upper middle-class New Jersey family, all of them just doing the best that they can. Daniel and Jared both go through the usual teenage rebellions, thinking they HATE their parents and will NEVER be like them. The usual locked doors, rages and tantrums. In the meantime you get an inside look at the parents' lives too, both in the present, and when they were young, newly married and struggling to keep it all together in the tumult of the sixties.

And Daniel, older, finally comes to better understand his parents. One of the most poignant and moving passages in the book comes in a scene where Daniel, about to be married, visits his parents, listens to a never-told story from his mother, and watches the two of them, now both sixty-ish, interacting together - "... and I glanced from one to the other, nearly choking with envy."

Scott Nadelson, probably because he is Jewish and from New Jersey, has been likened to a young Philip Roth. Well, maybe. He's got the skills, the writing chops. But the bitterness and the anger often found in Roth are missing. There's something else, something much warmer in SAVING STANLEY than I ever found in Roth. I think it's an innate respect for family, a recognition of the importance of family. I just LIKED Daniel Brickman a lot more than I ever did Alex Portnoy or Nathan Zuckerman, you know? Daniel is only somewhere in his twenties when this book ends. He's made his share of mistakes, has some regrets. His future remains uncertain. But I think he'll be okay. Yeah, I do.

I think I already said this once, but this is simply a damn fine book. I enjoyed it immensely and will recommend it highly.

P.S. Oh yeah, in case you're wondering - and this is not a a spoiler - Stanley is the family cat.… (mais)

I so much love to find a book of short stories in which all of the stories are engaging and well written. Those in this collection were about Jewish folks, although the stories themselves were not about Judaism per se. Those of us who are Jewish will find something vaguely familiar about the characters - even in their generic settings.

The uncertainty of human relationships is the theme that binds the stories. In "The Cantor's Daughter", a girl rebels against her father's parenting. "Half a Day in Halifax" examines the relationship of the attraction of a young couple who meet on a cruise. "Rehearsal" brings to the forefront a family's preconceived ideas about a wayward member.

However, the most powerful story was the longest and last one. Named "The Headhunter", it told of Len, a down-and-out young man and how his career as headhunter began to bloom when he found a better job for a chemist named Howard Rifkin. A headhunter is usually not friend to his clients. Whether Len and Rifkin were truly friends was uncertain, but everything that bound their so-called friendship was tested in this remarkable story.

Every story of this book was good, but the last one simply blew me away. What an exceptional way to end an excellent book!… (mais)