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A nice sculptor dies unexpectedly while saving a golden-haired child from a boating
accident. As his body is cremated and his ashes turn cold, the town of Salthill-on-Hudson
wonders: Who was Adam Berendt? His friends find their lives changed and changing after
Adam's death. Was he a hero, a brilliant artist, a strange and lost soul? Rumors abound as
the town women who loved him find themselves learning an awful lot they didn't know
about love. The men who were his confidantes realize that, actually, he was their
confidante, and are thus completely transformed in the months ahead.
Adam's death touches every single person he ever knew in ways that he probably would not
even have understood. No one knows that he had huge monetary holdings in several names; no
one knows where he was born or what his real name was. They had no reason to assume that
Adam at face value wasn't anything more than a pleasant and elusive bachelor sculptor who
had a blind eye and a hearty laugh and a quick and easy way with the pen-to-a-checkbook
for a good cause. And the swiftness with which he lost this gentle and good life makes
everybody else wonder what is really important in their lives and vow to change those
things that they don't like about themselves...and others.
Set at the dawn of the 21st century, MIDDLE AGE is a beautiful and exacting look at the
issue of identity. The characters are all drawn with such depth and care that you wonder
how Oates can put out a book this insightful so close to her last one, BLONDE, a different
kind of insightful novel. Oates continues her otherworldly prolific march to the top of
the mountain of American literary fiction. And one wonders if she, too, is a psychic ---
just weeks after the September 11 terrorist attacks, with the fast and unjust loss of
lives suffered and family and friends smothered by media attention in their grief, it is
hard to miss the sense in our culture regarding identity and a renewed sense of carpe diem
in our own lives. MIDDLE AGE is a saga, a winding, twisting, fascinating and utterly
readable look into the lives of the well-off in a little part of America that might as
well speak for all of us.
--- Reviewed by Jana Siciliano
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