“In all chaos, there is a cosmos, in all disorder a secret order. “ —Carl Jung
I’d like to pick a fight with Carl Jung right about now. For years, I’ve been living with chaos—we’re decade-long roommates—and I’m not seeing a whole lot of harmony or order spring out of the confusion. Just sayin. I sound cynical, I know. But here’s a fact to remember: when the chaos spills over into my precious reading minutes, I get cranky. Turning pages helps keep my world spinning. It took weeks to snatch interrupted time to listen to Mercury Pictures Presents. (Weeks, as in days on end.) Although breaking a book up over longer stretches of time usually fractures a read, I absolutely loved Anthony Marra’s latest. “Absolutely loved” doesn’t quite cut it—it was more of a big cosmos kind of love actually.
Why, oh why, have I not met Anthony Marra before now? I’m with the reviewer who asked, “What is it about the spare beauty of Anthony Marra’s prose that makes us want to laugh and cry at the same time?” He followed with, “I had been entirely transported by his stunning debut, A Constellation of Vital Phenomena, and still feel it’s the closest thing I’ve read to a “perfect” novel, one showcasing Marra’s thoroughgoing command of plot, character, and voice.” That debut five-star is en route, compliments of Amazon. Can’t wait.
Back to Mercury. I’m excited for you to meet Maria Lagana, one of several denizens who relocates from Mussolini’s Italy to Tinsel Town. She’s wily and ambitious—she manages to impress studio head, Artie Feldman, who hires her as a typist turned producer. Maria’s assimilation is seamless. She runs from her past, which involved unwittingly facilitating the internal exile of her anti-fascist father. Worlds collide for Maria when émigré Vincent Cortese arrives in LA. Like All The Light We Cannot See, golden threads weave through time, space, and small moments to connect characters in striking ways. You should know I laughed (Maria’s great aunts are a riot) and cried. When life settles down—if life settles down—I will read Mercury Pictures Presents all over again.
P.S. In honor of Rae’s fake friendship with Ann Patchett, I thought I’d include her high praise as well: “Marra has been compared to Nabokov, Kafka, and Orwell. The word 'brilliant' gets used in all his reviews. Mercury Pictures Presents… is full of history, comedy, and horror. It's a great literary read.”