In Promised Land, Jack Dann returns to the alternate America
of his acclaimed 2004 novel The Rebel: An Imagined Life of James Dean.
In that book, Dean, the most promising actor of his time, survived his
car crash in 1955, and lived on, making great movies and interacting
with some of the foremost personalities of the Fifties and Sixties
while drifting towards a strange political destiny in lockstep with
Robert Kennedy.
Now, Promised Land expands on that
premise, offering brilliant insights into Dean, the Kennedys, and
others, both as they were and as they might have been.
In this
volume's dexterously interlinked stories and novellas, we come to
understand Marilyn Monroe more vividly than ever before – her inner
conflicts, her indecision between lovers and lifestyles, between life
and death.
We witness the evolution of Elvis Presley from a
home-grown Memphis boy to a jaded superstar, the deaths of those
closest to him fuelling his alienation from his better nature.
We glimpse the paradoxical moral constitution of Bobby Kennedy, crusading idealist yet capable of deep cynicism and infidelity.
We come to know the wheedling eloquence of Jack Kerouac, and the bizarre psychology of William Burroughs.
And
connecting them all, in chains of passionate friendship and enigmatic
karmic sympathy, is the figure of Jimmy Dean, who believes his second
chance at existence is a trust from God, but who struggles to uncover
what exactly that means...
Promised Land is a superb
meditation on fame, love, and fate, replete with evocative dialogue,
rich characterization, and dazzling prose poetry. It is the story
collection of the year.
