Books
by Alan Isler
|
Clerical Errors |
Isler has created a world which seems almost real, but which has enough insanity to make it compulsive. The main character was born a Jew, but given to a Catholic as a child, to save him from the Nazis. He grows up to be a Catholic priest. And an atheist. Very funny (although I have a feeling I didn't get all of the jokes and allusions) and heart-breaking. I will read it again with relish.
(Julie Higgins - bwl 8 April 2001) |
|
|
The Living Proof |
Robin Sinclair, a British novelist, suggests Stan Kops, an American Jewish academic, as the biographer of Cyril Entwistle - the most important living British artist and a well-known anti-Semite - who is exceedingly difficult to write about, as he has invented most of the 'facts' of his life. Sinclair sits back and watches as things go terribly wrong for almost everyone involved. A very welcome addition to the small but beautifully formed output of Isler.
(Julie Higgins - bwl 32 November 2005) |
|
|
The Prince of West End Avenue |
Otto Korner, a Jewish refugee, ends up in the Emma Lazarus retirement home in Manhattan where the residents embark on a chaotic and jealousy-ridden production of Hamlet. Cast as the Ghost, he feels that at 83 he is ready to play the Prince......read on! Lovely, funny and touching, tragic as well. Alan Isler writes about his characters with great affection and by the end you feel you know and care for them all.
(Jenny Freeman - bwl 4 July 2004) |
|
|
The Prince of West End Avenue |
A group of residents in a Jewish retirement home are putting on a production of Hamlet and there is much fun in their rivalries and absurdities. The narrator cast as the Ghost but aspiring to play Hamlet gradually revisits his own life trying to find peace and redemption as he confronts how ambition and vanity led his family to the concentration camps. Chosen for my book group and second time round for me, it proved as funny, moving and compelling as before.
(Jenny Baker - bwl 100 Spring 2021) |
|
|
|
