"If Michael Chabon's "Moonglow" had been edited down and focused more on the grandmother, it may have been a powerful, shorter novel or novella. However, Chabon's latest, while much easier to read than his previous novel (not regarding difficulty), feels too often like a mash-up told through history with not a lot to grasp onto. Sure there's the space race, Nazi's fleeing to America, and a hope for an advanced future that never came to be, but these elements somehow, and despite Mr. Chabon's sharp writing, don't grab the reader in like they should. The chance meeting in the last act of the book felt contrived, predictable, for I knew it would happen, in some way, and when it did happen it played out exactly as I'd imagined it. Aside from the grandmother's mental illness and Chabon's acute awareness of suffering, I didn't end this book filled with questions (and my best friend just died) but instead asked myself what all these anecdotes through history added up to and the answer was: not much. The war portions of this book are a drag and the references to Pynchon only make the reader yearn to crack open "Gravity's Rainbow" and the mentioning of Salinger serves not to illuminate this story but to remind the reader that forlorn characters without faith can easily be read in "Nine Stories" and that book, at least, gives the reader something to wrestle with both emotionally and intellectually. I'm just not sure, even with a large heart, that Michael Chabon can reach the greatness and the depth that he seems to be chasing as of late, and should maybe be happy with his immense talent and not try for something that is out of his reach as a storyteller. Some will take issue and bemoan this last statement but as previously mentioned, I'm in mourning and this book was written to comfort those feeling lost like the characters we read about within but it never quite befriends you. "

"Thank GOD I finally finished this, I felt like I'd been reading it forever. Not gonna lie, I definitely skimmed the last 50-70 pages.

I remember really liking "The Adventures of Kavalier and Clay," but it's been almost ten years since the last time I read a Michael Chabon book ("The Yiddish Policeman's Union," which I also remember liking).

Maybe my tastes have changed a lot since then? I just found this book unbearably descriptive. SO many adjectives. Like I was complaining to my friend Nolan From Finance, this book is so descriptive it doesn't leave anything to the imagination. "Kidnapped" probably has 1/4th of the adjectives that this book has, and yet it's able to create much more memorable scenes.

The amount of description means sometimes there's paragraphs I couldn't believe I was reading. There's like a three-paragraph description in there about coffee cup lids. Another scene where it takes the character like three pages to GET ON A MOTORCYCLE. Cut!

There were so many scenes I would have edited out as well. Why did we need the subplot about the grandfather hunting a cat-eating python in Florida? Or all those scenes in World War II -- BORING.

The best part of the book was the most straightforward chapter, which is narrated from Chabon's P.O.V. as a child. I'm no longer surprised that Chabon has experimented w/ writing YA fiction, maybe I would enjoy those books more because he has to restrain his "style."

In short I would not recommend and I can't believe I spent a whole month trying to finish it. BOO. At least now I can dedicate myself more fully to "The Count of Monte Cristo." "