The Yiddish Policemen's Union

Chabon, Michael

2007

*/10

My copy of Yiddish Policemen's Union is the first edition hardback (the only copy the used section of Green Apple had). If you know anything about my reading habits, you might know how impressive it is that I made it all the way through. I seem to be physically incapable of reading a hardback. I will always prefer a paperback Foucault to a hardback Dr. Seuss. And yet, Chabon' s odd tale of displacement, loss, religion, politics, death, and chess kept me going from cover to cover.

The novel opens with an Edward Lear quote. I can't think of anything more fitting. The story was compelling, the writing enjoyable, and the characters engaging; but I finished it nearly a year ago, and I'm still not sure what it's about.

If you're going to read one four hundred page tale of a policeman trying to regain his identity in a Jewish Alaskan town in transition while investigating a murder no one is interested in, playing chess with dead men, and running away from his personal demons this year, than read Chabon's Yiddish Policemen's Union.

*I'm reserving rating this one until I figure it out. This might take a while.