Ghost Town: Tales of Manhattan Then and Now [Hardcover]

GHOST TOWN is part of Bloomsbury's Writer in the City series, in which a writer provides a story that captures the essence of a certain city. In this volume, Patrick McGrath takes on Manhattan and gives us three stories set at different times in the city's history, all of which concern a death. The way we die holds a mirror to how we live and each story provides a vivid picture of the age and the city.

"The Year of the Gibbet" takes place during a cholera epidemic. While waiting to succumb to the disease, Edmund reflects on the death of his mother and the role he played in it as a young boy. After the Battle of Long Island, in which the American forces narrowly escaped certain defeat under the cover of a providential storm, Edmund's mother gets involved in a plot to blow up the British ships holding New York harbor. Edmund's inability to lie spontaneously when he and his mother are questioned by British officers dooms her and she is hung as a traitor. Poor Edmund can never forgive himself for his guilelessness, even as his own time runs out.

"Julius" brings us to the Gilded Age. Julius is a puzzling disappointment to his father, a successful businessman. The boy's artistic personality inspires his sisters to rescue him by sending him to art school. The impressionable Julius is immediately smitten by his first nude model, a connection wholly inappropriate for a young man of his standing, and Julius's father seeks to put an end to it. The model disappears and Julius, devastated, loses his sanity. He is convinced that the model, Annie, has fallen victim to a sordid plot involving his art teacher and his father. When he lashes out in his own act of violence, he is confined in an asylum for decades. Upon his return to the house where he grew up, the world has passed him by but the truth of his experiences reverberates in the family legend: it is wrong to deny love.

Although the least gothic in tone, readers may find that "Ground Zero" is the most affecting of the stories as it deals with 9/11 and shows our own age's ghost stories in the making. Danny Silver has been seeing the same psychiatrist for years. He has intimacy issues, so his doctor is immediately suspicious when he claims to have fallen in love with a prostitute he hired a few days after the planes hit the World Trade Center. The prostitute has issues of her own, not the least being her claim that she is being haunted by a former client, a man who left her bed on 9/11 and went directly to work on the 104th floor. Everyone in this triangle is wounded in some way but the psychiatrist's plight is the most heart-rending. She's too close to Danny and expresses her concern in a way that inevitably drives him further into his troubled relationship.

The stories in GHOST TOWN are marked by a shared sense of loss and distance. Readers familiar with Patrick McGrath's earlier works will recognize his interest in violence and madness, as well as his formidable talent.

Three short stories in this book: different time periods, different events. Each story has its own `ghosts', all are set in New York.

In `The Year of the Gibbet', a man is haunted by the memory of his mother standing under a gibbet with a rope around her neck. It is the American War of Independence and, as she has defied the British forces occupying New York, she must pay. Fifty years later, and about to die himself, her son still feels guilty for his inadvertent part in her discovery and downfall.

The next story, `Julius' is set in the bustling New York of the 19th century. A ruthless merchant's sensitive son is denied the love of his life because of his father's prejudice against more recent immigrants who are flooding into the city. This results in a legacy of regret, madness and violence.

The final story, `Ground Zero' is set in New York in September 2001. A Manhattan psychiatrist tries to treat a client after the destruction of the World Trade Centre. Unfortunately, in her focus on him and the damage he has endured, she fails to realise the damage that she has also incurred.

While these stories are not directly related to each other, they complement each other. The individuals depicted, and the events they take part in, each represent a particular stage in New York's history.

This is my first introduction to the writing of Patrick McGrath. It won't be the last.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

Patrick McGrath, an extremely talented writer (and one of my favorites), departs from his usual gothic weirdness and delivers three (mostly) conventional stories that reflect much of New York City's unique characteristics. But the stories were very different in quality,..

'The Year of the Gibbet' chronicles life in lower Manhattan during the Revolutionary War. I found it to be an excellent slice of historical fiction, and quite educational. But it was short, and so the author had little to work with in regards to character development and plot.

'Julius' describes the life of an extended New York family from the 1830s to the 1880s (and a bit beyond). We witness massive changes to the city due to population growth and technological advances. The author tries to inject some gothic horror bits but I think it comes off rather silly. But like the first story, I found 'Julius' to be mostly of educational value.

'Ground Zero' has a few eclectic New Yorkers, including a prostitute, a couple of her clients, and a therapist all trying work through the trauma that the events of 9/11 wreaked upon their already messed up lives. I find the dialogue and the author's keen observations of the human psyche in response to unimaginably horror to be most enjoyable. I only wish the author had made 'Ground Zero' into a full length novel.

Bottom line: three stories that represent something of a hodgepodge of history and psychological analysis. Recommended.

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