The Last Flight of Poxl West by Daniel Torday

Our narrator is a young man whose “uncle” was a WWII hero.  The uncle writes a well-received memoir and we as readers are treated to both his story and his “nephew’s” reactions to such.  The war story has all the ingredients of a hit:  love and battles and sex and airplanes, desperate rescues and heroic adventures.  Our narrator is suitably in thrall.  The writing was pleasant: 

           “groans of downy sleep, death’s counterfeit” 

and

          “And isn’t that the very problem with even the simplest lie, let alone a lie the size of Poxl’s?  It             breeds suspicion, incredulity without bounds”

The book was fine.  I did not find it to be the masterpiece that some did.  In addition, and perhaps overriding what I might otherwise have thought of it, shortly after I read this I read Chabon’s Moonglow and Poxl West can’t hold a candle to “grandfather”, nor Torday to Chabon.  An unfair comparison probably as Chabon is a seasoned author and this is Torday’s first published novel but for anyone who reads both books, its an unavoidable comparison. 

Fun New Word:  vituperation

Rating:  #5 Good Enough