The Little Book
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- 3,99 €
Beschreibung des Verlags
She was loved by three men. Two were history.
Wheeler Burden is the last heir of the famous Boston banking Burdens; he lives in San Francisco and is a philosopher, rock idol, writer, lover of women, and recluse. So it's with some surprise that he wakes up many years earlier, in Vienna, where he's now older than his father (a WW2 hero), and much older than his grandfather (a man of uncertain temper).
When Wheeler meets the delectable Weezie, things quickly start to get complicated - as she holds the key to a crucial secret, one she's completely oblivious to . . .
And soon Wheeler realizes he must unravel a lifetime of memories before he can discover who he really is or what's gone on.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
A major BEA galley to grab, this debut from retired California private school headmaster Edwards pulls a Back to the Future on the Vienna that produced The Interpretation of Dreams and, eventually, Mein Kampf with a little Bill & Ted thrown in for good measure.The Little BookSelden Edwards. Dutton, (416p) The subtitle of Edwards's Twain-indebted debut, written over the course of 30 years, might be "A California Yankee in Doctor Freud's Court." Following a physical assault, Stan "Wheeler" Burden is precipitated into the past 1897 Vienna, to be exact from 1988 San Francisco. Wheeler has been a teenage baseball star and famed rock 'n' roller, but he's dreamed of Vienna since his prep school days, where his teacher, Arnauld Esterhazy, instilled a love of the city's gilded paradoxes. Vienna of 1897 is indeed hopping: Freud is discovering the Oedipus complex, Mahler is conducting his symphonies, and the mayor, Karl Lueger, is inventing modern, populist anti-Semitism which the young Hitler will soon internalize. Making this a true oedipal drama, Wheeler's father and grandparents come to town, too, all at different ages, and with very different agendas. Edwards has great fun with time travel paradoxes and anachronisms, but the real romance in this book is with the period, topped by nostalgia for the old-school American elite, as represented by the we-all-went-to-the-same-prep-school Burdens. This novel ends up a sweet, wistful elegy to the fantastic promise and failed hopes of the 20th century.
