Harry Kaplan's Adventures Underground

PUBLISHERS WEEKLY MAR 4, 1991

Set in waterlogged Memphis during the great flood of 1939, this yeasty, vibrant novel spins an unusual variation on the Huck Finn theme. For 15-year-old Harry Kaplan, recently transplanted from Brooklyn to Memphis's teeming Jewish ghetto, working in his father's pawnshop is a bore. So bookish, comically awkward Harry hooks up with two orphaned black twins, wise-guy Lucifer and his tagalong mute brother Michael. In scenes of almost hallucinatory power, renegade Harry and the twins navigate flooded Beale Street, exploring brothels, cabarets, a wrecked steamboat and the stereotypes each culture harbors toward the other. When he's not hanging out with his ``forbidden friends,'' Harry copes with his well-heeled, shady Uncle Morris, cantankerous Grandpa Isador, and with his attraction toward his mousy cousin Naomi. In Harry, Stern ( Lazar Malkin Enters Heaven ) has found a rambunctious narrator who infuses this delightful, wry tale with moments of hilarity and a slew of apt Yiddishisms.