Maps and Legends: Reading and Writing Along the Borderlands Book

Michael Chabon is to writing what I am to making Kraft Macaroni & Cheese (okay, that's a little bit of an exaggeration'Chabon isn't THAT good of a writer).

While I'm sure there is an immeasurable amount of effort and diligence behind it, his prose flows effortlessly across the page, and everything he writes is linguistic treasure, whether you enjoy the story/topic or not. In this collection of essays that explore the interplay between genre fiction, flights of fancy, and literature, I'm happy to report that the topics are almost universally enjoyable (though, man, does that guy like to prattle on about golems).

There's a downside to reading Chabon if you harbor any aspirations toward storytelling yourself, as you realize that you'll never even come close to approximating the skill and confidence with which Chabon writes, even when he's writing about his own insecurity as a writer. But, that's a small price to pay to witness the dazzling interplay of his words as he synthesizes so many aspects of literature and pop culture, from Sherlock Holmes to comic books to noir to, yes, golems, golems, golems (which I'm pretty sure is the name of the discount store at which you can purchase all of your golem-making supplies).

If you've read and enjoyed Chabon's novels, you'll undoubtedly enjoy this. If you haven't and you're wondering if this is a good point to jump into Chabon's oeuvre, I'd say yes, with one extremely large caveat: you need to enjoy writing about writing and the intellectual trappings that go along with reading one of American literature's foremost stylists attacking that task with gusto. So, it's not for everyone, and if you're new to Chabon, I'd recommend The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay first and foremost (Wonder Boys would be a close second, though I personally prefer The Mysteries of Pittsburgh…Wonder Boys just feels more broadly accessible).

It's unlikely that Chabon will ever truly scale the heights of his profession in the same way that I have when it comes to boiling water, ripping open a blue box, pouring in dried elbow macaroni, cooking it to just the right state of al dente, draining it, adding in the perfect amount of butter, dumping in the cheese powder, and then pouring in at least twice as much milk as is called for (try it'you'll thank me), and mixing it all together before serving it to discerning gourmands. But, the guy's about as good as it gets when it comes to stringing words together on a page, and never more so than when he's waxing poetic about Sherlock Holmes.

Well worth a read.