Mosaic Man is part Tropic of Cancer, part Steppenwolf, part Breakfast of Champions as Sukenick uses Jewish folklore and history to weave his very avant-garde stories of a modern Jewish man in search of his roots.
The book begins with a stream-of-self-consciousness diatribe against Nazism and anti-Semitism, which is predictable, and can be a bit overwrought in places. The second chapter/story is a very Vonnegut-style mix of symbols accompanied by the fragmented transcription of a lengthy recorded interview with Sukenick's grandparents. In this chapter, we get a glimpse into Sukenick's roots that leaves the reader with the same sense of incompleteness that leads the author into his quest to fill in the missing words.
My favorite section of the book was a very comic book style dream sequence in which the author teams up with a character called Captain Midnight, who takes him into WWII Germany to fight the Nazis. It gives a unique perspective on the "present's" desire to return to the "past" for a sense of closure.
But the novel isn't all in an "avant-pop" style. When it comes to writing prose, Sukenick can be quite poetic. For example, Sukenick describes his impression of Jerusalem:
"with its dry, visual clarity, its hard definition, redefinition, over-definition of the holy turf, gems heaped on a pale table refracting sharply but differently from different perspectives . . . each monopolizing the attention in turn with its dazzling, singular and dominating brilliance, the contrast with Tel Aviv, hazy, amorphous, voluptuous and Mediterranean, could not be more striking."
Mosaic Man's stories are not for the average reader. At times, to quote one of Sukenick's own characters, "I think they're written in secret code." But, if you're up for a mind-popping literary experience, Sukenick is right up your alley.
And he's probably lurking there waiting for you.
