The Anatomy Lesson (First Edition)

Taking its inspiration (and its title) from the famous Rembrandt masterpiece that depicts a seventeenth-century public autopsy, The Anatomy Lesson follows Kiddo, a streetwise ingenuous American teenager who has exiled himself by choice in modern Amsterdam. Sponging off the Dutch welfare system and trading dole for drugs, Kiddo is fighting for his life to come to terms with the premature death of his older brother Morton. A bona fide genius with his halo of flame-red hair shining like a beacon of intelligence, Morton, even in death, was always the patron saint and guru for his younger sibling. But gradually Kiddo begins to unveil the chilling, dark side of his brother that he never knew. Honoring his last request, Kiddo must bear witness to Morton's autopsy. The anatomy lesson proves to be only the beginning of a painful journey of emotional and sexual awakening that is at once both devastating and liberating.

The first half of this resonant, witty, emotionally rich novel limns the dysfunctional relationship between the narrator, Kiddo, a half-American teen self-exiled to his father's native Amsterdam, and Kiddo's older brother, Morton, a genius inventor. Though Kiddo and Morton manage to sublimate their intense rivalry and learn to rely on each other, Kiddo feels inferior to his brilliant sibling. At 16, Kiddo loses his virginity to the mixed-up Pietje?and Morton is right there on the bed, pitching in. But Kiddo doesn't mind: "With Pietje between us, I feel equal for the first time. Triangular's not the word for a thing without corners. This is smooth and round, a perfectly circular relationship." Soon, however, Morton moves back to America and contracts cancer, leading to an astonishing set piece: a grueling description of Morton's autopsy as observed by Kiddo, Pietje and a handful of their friends. The novel's second, less compelling, half is given over to how, through Pietje and a tell-all letter from Morton, Kiddo comes to understand that although he and Morton, as Pietje says, "put on this brotherly act... deep down they hate each other's guts." Morley is a marvelous writer, and his central metaphor?the eponymous Rembrandt painting depicting an autopsy?makes the narrative reverberate with meaning. Still, one wishes that an author this talented had found less familiar angles to his characters than sibling rivalry and first love. Two photographs?not seen by PW.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Living on the dole in Amsterdam, American teen Kiddo is paralyzed with grief over the premature death of his beloved older brother. Morton, with his flame-red hair and his radiant intelligence, was Kiddo's hero and guru, always inventing marvelous contraptions and tossing off sophisticated theories. Now Kiddo is haunted by Morton's ghost, which usually appears to him after he's spent the night drinking and drugging, and by memories of Morton's autopsy, which he witnessed in fulfillment of his brother's last request. Some three years after Morton's death from cancer, Kiddo is still reeling until their mutual girlfriend, Pietje, begins to tell him stories of his brother's dark side, a process that proves both painful and liberating. Morley writes hypnotic but chilling prose, and he captures the envy and admiration of these brothers with crackling dialogue and mordant humor. An incredibly depressing, dead-on portrait of inept parents and aimless youth. Joanne Wilkinson

Morley's new novel, hard on the heels of The Feast of Fools (LJ 12/94), portrays half-Dutch, American-born brothers Morton and Kiddo, who have followed their divorced, modestly talented father/inventor to Amsterdam. Morton takes after dad, showing promise as an engineer, but bohemian Kiddo is more like their mother. When the story opens, Morton has died but continues to haunt Kiddo, who, it turns out, still has some of Morton's inner organs in jars at home, remnants of an autopsy a la Rembrandt's painting. Kiddo once idolized Morton, but his feelings changed when he learned that Morton tried to convince Pietje, a young woman whose bed both brothers have shared, to accompany him to MIT. When Morton's cancer provokes a confessional letter, Kiddo learns of his brother's resentment over their mother's preference for the younger son. The autopsy, witnessed by Kiddo, Pietje, and some stoned friends, is particularly chilling, as Kiddo watches each organ lifted from the body. Although perhaps too brief, this is an affecting, subtle, and complex work with faint echoes of Hawkes and Knowles.?Harold Aubenbraum, Mercantile Lib., New York
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.