The Fire Agent
From the opening pages of The Fire Agent, we know that we are in the hands of a confident, capable storyteller. With fluid prose and a compelling central character, David Baerwald’s family saga, based on the life of his grandfather, encompasses two world wars and their aftermaths ... At times Baerwald seems torn about whether to give us a novel or a sort of memoir, once removed, of his grandfather’s life ... Still, this is a wonderfully readable book ... The novel’s only major stumble comes near the end, when, just after Ernst has received the most devastating news of his life, Baerwald takes us on a 30-page detour into a search for a purported cache of looted treasure ... After such a long and exhilarating ride with Ernst it feels annoyingly like stopping off for an afternoon at Disney World on the way home from a grand tour of Asia and Europe.
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With emotional acuity and scintillating prose, Baerwald excavates the ruins of humanity’s best intentions in this capacious and multigenerational saga that asks to be savored more than once ... An entrancing and sublime tale of love, carnage, and the 20th century’s misplaced faith in human progress.
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A sweeping tale of both world wars, the dashed idealism of the interwar period, and the dread brought about by the atom bomb attacks on Japan ... It’s a considerable amount of history, but Baerwald tells the story in short digestible bursts ... It’s an illuminating saga.
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