The Literal Truth: Rizzoli Dreams of Eating the Apple of Earthly Delights

1994 CANIO'S EDITIONS SOFTCOVER

The Literal Truth draws readers into Rizzoli's surreal escapades, begun in Ciabattari's well-received Dreams of an Imaginary New Yorker Named Rizzoli . With unerring irony, Ciabattari paints a shimmering, disorienting world in which the lines between dreams and reality are systematically skewed with each chapter. The plot takes shape when Rizzoli notices that everyone's net worth appears in lights above their heads. His number (which increases inexplicably) shines like a beacon to Hamptonites who see him as a potential investor. He knows his worth is grossly exaggerated, but still he gets caught up in the power of his appearance. Ciabattari ingeniously illustrates the human predicament of being a prisoner of appearances. Although Rizzoli's circumstances are extreme, readers are aware that his fears ring exactly true. Set against the vibrant backdrop of New York City and the Hamptons, Rizzoli's chaotic life seems to be a natural extension of the city and human consciousness.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Ciabattari's Chaplin-esque walker in the city, Rizzoli (Dreams of an Imaginary New Yorker Named Rizzoli, 1989), returns in a series of surreal, episodic, and intellectually playful cinematic dreamscapes that veer from wish fulfillment to nightmare. Rizzoli remains a victim of his dream logic. ``In the grip of appearances,'' this comic cosmopolitan finds himself battling his eight-foot muffler in an epic struggle that ends with a Pyrrhic victory. Though his desire to solve the homeless problem is thwarted, he enjoys a number of strange power fantasies: He's ravished by a sexy video image from a favorite film; he buys fine art at bargain basement prices because reproductions have surpassed originals in value; and he discovers that he's become an accidental millionaire. What seems at first a horrific manifestation of the ``American dream''--everyone's net worth appears holographically over their heads--soon becomes a boon for Rizzoli. As his assets increase rapidly, despite a paltry sum in the bank, store clerks and celebrities defer to him. A parade of all the people in his life marches up Fifth Avenue. During interludes in the Hamptons, he hobnobs with the beautiful people. In one extraordinary episode, he and a producer exist only within the dimensions of a movie, becoming close-ups, pans, and voice-overs. A local train delivers him into a premodern idyll of Bronx sheep meadows, where Rizzoli aids in the birth of a lamb. But his adventures end on a cynical note: a scene in a betting parlor that makes literal the notion of life as a horse race. A paean to the special ``city grace'' that prevails amid chaos, Ciabattari's clever and cartoonish novel is a delightful postmodern romp, more Calvino than Kafka. -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

The character Ciabattari, introduced in Dreams of an Imaginary New Yorker Named Rizzoli (1990), resumes his surreal career in dreams that are the fabric of Everyman's anxieties, at least if Everyman were from Manhattan. In one vision, Rizzoli sees tiny New Yorkers suspended from strings made of memories; as the tiny persons are killed by a crazed woman with a broom, the memories of their larger counterparts also die. In another, Rizzoli confronts a car that asserts a mind of its own as he tries to move it across the street. In the most extended dream, everyone goes about displaying his or her net financial worth in a hologram suspended over his or her head, but Rizzoli is the victim of a clerical error in which his ascends to astronomical levels while his actual bank account shows a balance of some $1,700. The apparent wealth leads him into a series of social escapades in which he is able to dazzle all and even to finance movie projects, although all the while he wonders whether his checks will bounce. A delightfully improbable blending of Borges and Woody Allen. John Shreffler

In the second collection of vignettes (following Dreams of an Imaginary New Yorker Named Rizzoli, Dutton, 1990) featuring middle-aged New Yorker Rizzoli, Ciabattari skillfully captures the nature of dreams, using a mixture of reality and surrealism to reveal our common fears and desires. One chapter shows what happens when everybody's net worth is displayed as a hologram above his or her head-with Rizzoli's being vastly inflated. In another chaper, Rizzoli witnesses a woman beating to death miniature New Yorkers climbing rope ladders; he subsequently discovers that particular memories are also being destroyed. This postmodern novel is plotless, with no character development to speak of. The dreams are sometimes poignant, sometimes funny, and sometimes horrifying but always thought-provoking. Recommended for large fiction collections or those that emphasize experimental fiction.
Nancy Pearl, Washington Ctr. for the Book, Seattle
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.