Everyone and No One: - Hardcover

Jacobson, Mark

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0679456562 ISBN 13: 9780679456568

Publisher: Villard, 1997

Synopsis

In this magical jet-fueled saga, a Hollywood actor is granted a new face--and gets more than he bargained for. By virtue of his unique face, Taylor Powell is the greatest lover in Hollywood history. But he's sick of being "The Face, " so, after miraculously surviving a plane crash in which he is presumed dead, Taylor engages an enigmatic plastic surgeon to make him unrecognizable.

About this title

From the Inside Flap

cal jet-fueled saga, a Hollywood actor is granted a new face--and gets more than he bargained for. By virtue of his unique face, Taylor Powell is the greatest lover in Hollywood history. But he's sick of being "The Face, " so, after miraculously surviving a plane crash in which he is presumed dead, Taylor engages an enigmatic plastic surgeon to make him unrecognizable.

Reviews

Journalist and novelist Jacobson (Gorijo, 1991) again ventures into Tom Robbins's territory for a seriocomic fiction that purports to be a profound commentary on America's obsession with appearance, tricked up with all sorts of anthro-religious jive. The narrator is one Taylor Powell, a Tom Cruiselike superstar known simply as ``The Face.'' Along with best friend and Oscar co- winner Jimmy Dime (``a character actor with attitude''), Taylor enjoys an endless supply of the opposite sex. But the pressures of satisfying most of the country's female population are starting to weigh heavily. So when his private jet crashes, and he alone survives, he seizes the opportunity to remake himself. In Mexico, he seeks out the mysterious Dr. Parry, a former Hollywood plastic surgeon now engaged in a higher cause, who turns Taylor Powell into Dean Taylor, a nobody with a face that nevertheless has its unique features--and a kind of mystical resonance. (He is, it seems, now a kind of proletarian Everyman.) In Mexico, Dean also meets for the first time the mythic ARANA, a strange band of violent crazies who are evil personified, and with whom he becomes locked in permanent struggle: Even in remote Florida, where Dean eventually becomes a carpenter, marries, and settles down, ARANA rears its ugly head. But the real problem emerges when Dean and his wife have a son, who, not surprisingly, resembles ``The Face'' and acts out against his mysterious father without a past. The plot hurtles through time with the speed of the comet that's threatening the Earth--a looming disaster in which Dean recognizes the hand of ARANA. Dean plays a crucial role in dispersing the comet, thwarting ARANA once again, and then, his mission apparently accomplished, disappearing again, taking on yet another identity. Jacobson's one-note humor wears thin very quickly, and his ad- hoc metaphysics simply annoy. -- Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Author of the popular Gojiro (LJ 2/15/91), Jacobson is back with a quirky gem: Kurt Vonnegut meets Tom Robbins. Hop aboard for a fast read as gorgeous Taylor Powell, Hollywood's "The Face," acquires an unremarkable new face, identity, and family and a chance to save Earth from a comet. While Taylor/Dean is battling evil, we experience along with him the conflicts inherent in father-son relationships, masculinity, the complicated burdens of beauty, and our relationship to each other and to God. Jacobson's absurdist/surreal style lets him tackle these topics without being wordy or overly philosophical. The powers of Taylor's/ Dean's new face are wonderfully explored in a quixotic novel that is refreshingly hopeful amidst postmodern disasters. For most popular collections.
-?Rebecca Sturm Kelm, Northern Kentucky Univ. Lib., Highland Heights
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Villard
• Publication date: 1997
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0679456562
• ISBN 13: 9780679456568
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 227