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Loading... The Great Mistakeby Jonathan Lee
Mystery & Detective (109) Loading...
Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. Er war der Mann, der Greater New York zu dem gemacht hat, was es heute ist. Und doch ist der Erschaffer des Central Parks, der New York Public Library und des Metropolitan Museum of Art weitgehend unbekannt, nur eine winzige Plakette an schwer zugänglicher Stelle im Central Park erinnert an ihn und ein Gemälde, das jedoch nicht öffentlich zugänglich ist. Jonathan Lee beginnt die Geschichte des größten Bauherrn der Stadt mit dessen Todestag. An dem unheilvollen Freitag, dem 13. November 1903 wird Andrew Haswell Green vor seinem Haus in der Park Avenue von Cornelius Williams mit fünf Kugeln erschossen. Wie auch in seinem Roman „Wer ist Mr Satoshi?“ lässt Jonathan Lee die Geschichte von einem Ende her erzählen, das jedoch zahlreiche Fragen aufwirft. Während sich Inspector McClusky auf die Erforschung der Gründe für den Mord macht, erfährt der Leser, wie aus dem armen Farmerjungen aus Massachusetts der Mann werden konnte, der das Bild des Big Apples für immer prägen sollte. Im Wechsel taucht man ein in die Lebensgeschichte Greens und die Ermittlungen, die trotz der Festnahme des Tatverdächtigen nur langsame Fortschritte machen. Am prägendsten für Green war sicher die Freundschaft mit Samuel J. Tilden, Rechtsanwalt und späterer Gouverneur von New York und Präsidentschaftskandidat. Er nahm den damaligen Lehrling unter seine Fittiche, ermöglichte den Aufstieg und ermutigte ihn auch, seine Träume zu verfolgen. Auch wenn ein Mord im Zentrum steht, ist der Roman doch sicherlich kein Krimi – allein das Ergebnis der Ermittlung verbittet dies schon. Lee hat eine spannende Mischung aus Biografie einer Person und einer Stadt erschaffen, man spürt den Herzschlag New Yorks. Einerseits fließen vielfältige Details in die Handlung ein, dann wiederum lässt der Autor auch Leerstellen, beispielsweise wenn es um das Verhältnis von Green und Tilden geht. Er bedient damit keinen Voyeurismus, ebenso wie man kaum Greens Gedankenwelt bei der Erschaffung seiner großen Werke nachvollziehen kann. Lee gelingt im letzten Kapitel ein grandioser Abschluss, der vielleicht am besten die schwer zufassende Figur Andrew H. Green beschreibt: „Parks. Brücken. Große Institutionen. Kunst. Sie waren die einig erschwinglicheren Formen der Unsterblichkeit (...) Doch kam ihm hier und jetzt der Gedanke (...), dass all seine öffentliche Arbeit nicht so viel bedeutete, wie einen Freund zu haben, der seine Hand hielt, wenn er starb.“ Andrew Green was the middle son of an emotionally distant father who never believed his son would prosper. Sent off to New York City at an early age as an apprentice to a mercantile owner, Andrew was socially insecure and a loner. At a later age, he goes to Trinidad where he supervises on a sugar plantation. The book opens with his murder at the age of 83 on the streets of New York. Andrew had achieved much in his life after his experiences in Trinidad. He never married but was close friends with Samuel Tilden who was an unsuccessful candidate for President in the 1876 election after an electorial controversy . The book skips around in time between Green's childhood, his relationship with Tilden and his own family, and the killer who blamed Green for keeping a woman away from him. This is somewhat of a mystery with lots of history about New York City as Green was responsible for many of NYC's landmarks: The Met, Central Park, and others. Interesting book. no reviews | add a review
"From the acclaimed author of High Dive comes an enveloping, exultant novel of New York City at the turn of the twentieth century, a story of one man's rise to fame and fortune, and his murder in a case of mistaken identity. On Friday the 13th of November, 1903, a famous man was killed on Park Avenue in broad daylight by a stranger. It was neither a political act nor a crime of passion. It was a mistake. The victim was Andrew Haswell Green, the "Father of Greater New York," who shaped the city as we know it. Without him there would be no Central Park, no Metropolitan Museum of Art, no Museum of Natural History, no New York Public Library. His influence was everywhere, yet he died alone, misunderstood, feeling that his whole life might have been, after all, a great mistake. A work of tremendous depth and piercing emotion, The Great Mistake is a portrait of a self-made man--farm boy to urban visionary; the reimagining of a murder investigation that shook the city; and the moving story of a singular individual who found the world closed off to him, and, in spite of all odds, enlarged it"-- No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)823.92Literature English English fiction Modern Period 2000-LC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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There is not much going on in the way of plot - the only things really driving it are (a) your desire to find out what motivated Green's involvement in major public projects like creating New York's Central Park; and (b) the mystery around why Green gets shot in his eighties (NB not a spoiler - this is in the blurb and happens at the start of the book). I didn't find either of these was enough to keep the momentum going over the full length of the novel and the last section was quite hard going. I felt that (a) had already been covered by what we find out about Green's childhood and life as a young adult (although I did find these parts more compelling and others have noted, the author manages to generate a fair bit of sympathy for Green). With (b), there wasn't much mystery to it, ultimately (and I'd guessed what the answer was long before it was confirmed). Another problem with it is that, because we start with him dying in his eighties, we already know quite a lot about what he has become and so any tension over things like "Will Green get back in touch with his close friend Samuel Tilden when he returns from working in Trinidad?" is largely absent - we already know he does, so the only question is how this happens.
Perhaps I shouldn't complain about the lack of such mundane things as plot - after all, this is a literary novel and my mind should surely be on higher things..... As I say, I could appreciate its literary merits, but I was less bowled over by them than some of the reviewers quoted on the book jacket. Did I actually enjoy reading it? Well, if I'm honest, only parts of it - getting all the way to the end felt like quite hard work. ( )