From Publishers Weekly
This massive novel shifts from promising delight to annoying didacticism as it tells the epic story of Ray Green, a fictional 1930s radio actor who portrayed The Green Ray, stouthearted protector of truth, justice and all that is best in the American spirit. Ne Reuven Agranovsky (a son of Russian Jewish immigrants), Green continues an obsession with his superhero persona after the show goes off the air in the 1940s. Fink traces Green's quest to make the heart of America larger during the promise of the 1950s, the tumult of the 1960s and 1970s and the greed of the 1980s. Even when all hope seems lost as the novel approaches our time, a suicidal Green decides to go on living. The theme of this first novel by Fink ( Cluck! The True Story of Chickens in the Cinema ) is a compelling one, and its realistic nostalgia has some power. Unfortunately, Fink's style all but debilitates his message. The tale is told in Green's prosaically unsophisticated voice, with key words in nearly every sentence capitalized to indicate their importance. By the end of 600 pages, readers will feel as though they have been beaten about the head with a badly worded inspirational greeting card.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Review
“Dazzling. . . . never loses [its] light touch. . . . Fink not only faithfully recreates the old world of radio serials, but also brings his na?ve main character into the morally ambiguous 1980s and gives him a sad, stubborn dignity.” (Chris Petrakos, Chicago Tribune )
“Adventures uses Green’s semi-literate style to beautiful effect. . . . Further Adventures is creative, wrenching, even funny—an intelligent look at pop morality taken to its logical extreme.” (James Poniewozic, New York Perspectives )
“A freewheeling, high-energy tour de force. . . . Breathtaking in its juxtaposition of wisecracks and tragedy, with a veritable Don Quixote running loose in the American Southwest: a distinctive debut.” (Kirkus Reviews (starred review) )
“Impressive. . . . Fink has a fine ear for dialogue [and] Ray Green is a truly original creation.” (Time Out London )
“Marvelous. …[its] two plots, past and present, trot in and out of the ring like trick ponies, carrying an impossibly colorful but appealing cast of characters.…The plot is as absurd as it is intricate…it’s fun and sad at the same time. (Terry Bisson, Washington Post )
“A stylistic tour de force....engagingly comic, hypnotically seductive...an authentically psychotic monologue [blending] the bombastic strains of superhero fantasia and a familiar streak of ironic Jewish pragmatism....charismatic.” (Madison Smartt Bell, New York Times )
“Extraordinary. . . . The novel that’s surprised and impressed me most this year.” (Douglas Adams, “Books of the Year,” The Guardian (UK) )