In a future where sweeping civil conflict has forced America's young people to flee its borders, Ron Patterson begins to imagine a stable life for himself, but when political divisions become resurgent, he is suddenly on dangerous and uncertain ground.
... deeply intriguing ... a tense and often beautiful work of reflection on the American present ... What’s more interesting in “Little America” is an idea Kalfus repeats often: that the displaced Americans have a 'look' and way of being that sets them apart from the locals. Nostalgic for the consumerism of home, they build crude replicas of big-box retailers, complete with their familiar color schemes. They share a passion for walking dogs. 'People wore their clothes in the American style,' Kalfus writes, 'and their faces were recognizably American.' But if the country they came from was a global melting pot, what does an 'American' face look like? One wishes Kalfus had explored this idea further. Race and class conflicts are at the heart of the real-life disorder Americans are living, but Kalfus elides those differences in this work. Still, 2 A.M. in Little America is a highly readable, taut novel. It pulls the reader into its world, and suggests that many interesting human complications await us at the end of the story called the United States of America.
Kalfus has a gift for penetrating to the core of current events and presenting issues in a provocative way. If anxiety is a state you want literature to engender in you, or you just like a challenging read, you’ll be happy to know that Kalfus succeeds again, this time with a quietly dystopian novel that presents an unsettling portrait of a humbled America as seen through the eyes of a migrant who is a not entirely reliable narrator ... At times, Kalfus is too coy. A great way to build tension is to withhold information, but an excellent way to destroy it is to extend a mystery for too long ... often feels like the literary equivalent of an elegant coffee table with one leg slightly shorter than the rest: well constructed but lopsided ... Once it gets going, 2 A.M. in Little America gains considerable momentum on its way to a satisfying if uncertain conclusion.
Though imperiled by re-emergent militias, a needful policeman, and the reappearance of another maybe-familiar face, Ron keeps on surviving, clinging to dreams of a home that no longer exists. As it progresses, his tale becomes a potent warning about the consequences of ideological fervor. Heartbreaking and sobering, the dystopian novel 2 A.M. in Little America has the makings of a modern classic.
Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay[/caption]
