For me, Loon Lake had its moments. But the style—some of it written in a kind of computer-printout blank verse, with side trips into Zen Japan—kept getting in the way. I think Doctorow is trying for a certain kind of irony, a saturnine, perhaps even prophetic, view of both the poor and rich in America, their intertwining and colliding destinies. But the balance goes awry.

It could be that Doctorow shares too much with his hero, a certain over-respect for the super-rich; F. W. Bennett, a rather boring character, is written up as a wise and shaggy Buddha casting his spell everywhere. The plot becomes mechanistic, the characters puppets in a No play. A kind of Oriental stoicism may be part of the author's point. Philosophically, that is his right. But it robs the novel of real dramatic punch and what could have been considerable humanity...