Rating: 
Summary: "Crimes" Disappoints.
Review: Pulitzer Prize winning author Annie Proulx disappoints us with her new novel, "Accordion Crimes." Certainly she does nothing to dispel the idea that she is one of the most assured craftsmen of the language, but whereas in "The Shipping News" she built a world and a plot to carry her poetic language, here she gives us very little beside it. This is not enough.
"Accordion Crimes" is a book with a premise that doubles as a plot device, but never gets beyond this stricture into a satisfying work of fiction. The accordion in question is made by a Sicilian immigrant, sent to American to make enough money so that his family might join him. Lynched in anti-immigrant riots in New Orleans, the accordion passes into the hands of itinerant river-men, so beginning its picaresque train through the lives of another seven immigrant families. One of the great problems with this conceit is the tenuous link between all of the sections. Proulx seems to consider that the possession of the accordion makes each family worthy of a section in her book. In all honesty it is frequently far less than enough. Few of the sections reveal her full range of talents, and the role of the accordion is arbitrary at best in many of the stories.
And here is another problem with the book: these episodes are stories. Despite the claims that "Accordion Crimes" is a novel there is a mechanical dullness to the procession of sections that breaks up the flow of any overall narrative thread, and threatens to lose the reader in more than one place. For example, once one realizes that each section of the book is fifty pages in length one starts to check how many pages to go before there is a switch to another, hopefully more interesting, section. Sadly, it too often feels like Proulx is doing the same thing. She has characters here, but no characterization. This denies our engagement and, having witnessed her success with characterization in "The Shipping News" and "Postcards", it is puzzling that she should have so completely abandoned her strength. Ending the lives of many of her characters in bizarre and ghoulish ways does not give their lives any extra depth, yet this device is tried in many of the sections. Annie Proulx knows better than most that characters are interesting when they are alive, but these characters are flat puppets, tormented then dumped by the omniscient narrative voice.
During the planning stages of this novel the structure and the thread of the passed-on accordion must have looked very satisfying, but in execution it is not. The instrument cannot hold the attention necessary for the novel to work, and the characters through whose hands it passes are never given a chance to interest us. As a patchwork of the immigrant population of the United States this book is a sadly disappointing failure. In her foreword, Annie Proulx proudly thanks those who helped her research the accordion and its cultural influence. She thanks those who read the manuscript for accordion detail errors. It is a pity that she didn't have someone to point out that detail, fine language, and a scheme would not make a satisfying work of fiction. For this book Annie Proulx has shelved what she does best: using her incredible powers of language to create real characters who stay with us long after we finish reading. There is no Loyal Blood nor Owen Quoyle here, and we miss them. Instead we are given an accordion that is, by the end of the book, battered to destruction. Unfortunately many readers may not reach that far, and those who do may simply fail to care.
Rating: 
Summary: incredible beauty and originality of language
Review: The depth and breadth of Proulx's writing ability is marvelously realized in this cleverly conceived anthology of lives tied together by a small green accordion. Far from the iconoclastic Northeast which bounded The Shipping News, this novel spans the time and geography beginning in late-19th Century Italy and ending in 1996 Texas, making one feel throughout that the author is a native of each of the regions and cultures. Her beauty of description and originality of metaphor is stunning for contemporary fiction, and her use of dialect is rich, diverse, and squarely places the reader within each culture. One does not read this book -- one experiences it. If you want to see how truly to make sentences soar, READ THIS BOOK!!!!
Rating:
Summary: "Crimes" challenges our belief in the American myth.
Review: We like to believe in the good life in America. We like to believe that if we work hard and have good intentions, then essentially good things will happen to us and our loved ones. Annie Proulx's masterful cultural history of America challenges such a sense of security. By following the travails of an accordian from its 18th century Italian creator through a succession of owners in different parts of the United States and Canada, Proulx forces us to rethink our value of hard work and success. She effectively removes the myth that good things happen to the industrious and good of heart. With this understanding, Proulz confronts her readers with developing a new understanding of behavior. If one is not rewarded with health, wealth or love by their hard work, why bother. The answer becomes simply work for work itself. The satisfying moments of Proulx's world are those brief flickering moments when hard work displays its self in its own grandeur, appreciated by its creator for his own enjoyment. "Accordian Crimes" is a prime example of such workmanship. The finely crafted prose and carefully researched scenes are a joy to read, even as its message is unsettling
Rating: 
Summary: Accordion lives
Review: I, too, loved The Shipping News and began this book eager to see where Proulx would take me next. Wow. Accordion Crimes has a certain bizarrerie that reminds me of Cien años de soledad, as well as displaying Proulx's dazzling command of the English language and encyclopedic knowledge of all sorts of interesting things (unlike more than one reviewer on this site, I found most of the technical descriptions fascinating). As the grandchild of immigrants, I found it salutary to be reminded that not every immigrant family adapted as successfully as mine. I'm sure everyone will be shocked when I reveal that I know little about jazz music and am not particularly fond of the accordion, except as part of a klezmer band; what's impressive about this novel is that, despite this fact, I found this particular accordion's life story a real page-turner. As for the almost uniformly unlikeable characters ... well, unfortunately there are a lot of people in this world who aren't very nice, and it's about time someone wrote a novel about some of them!
Rating: 
Summary: Sad Sad work by a writer I was supposed to "love"
Review: I had been encouraged to read work by Annie P, and this, unfortunately, was my first attempt. Really horrific novel, and truly mediocre writing. The plot meandered and the characters were barely sketched with a thin pencil. I would have enjoyed a thorough description of each person, say the three Germans in the beginning, for instance, and for her to stay with them and develop them a little. Instead she flits from character to character like a mosquito grabbing an evening meal in a teensy bit of blood and then flits along to the next victim of her characterization. I won't bother with anything further by this author, as I felt this booked was a half - witted attempt at giving a literary view of an accordion's life, but instead it was a mish-mash of heathens, misfits, murderers, thieves, liars, adulterers, poor victims. She seems to enjoy picking on many races - italians, germans, creole negroes, texans ... it is really awful. Don't waste your time, much less your money or your gray matter on this very, very, very bad novel.
Rating:
Summary: Pass the Prozac
Review: This has to be one of the most depressing, dismal "novels" I have ever read, and I have a graduate degree in English. I thought it would be interesting since I play the accordion, but it wasn't. I, like other reviewers, struggled to finish this book. I have never read a book so filled with characters who are the scum of the earth. I get enough of that watching the local news here in Atlanta. If you're thinking about buying "Accordion Crimes," don't waste your money or your time. P.S. The correct spelling is accordion, not accordian!
Rating:
Summary: The lowly accordion comes to life
Review: "Accordion Crimes" is an imaginative and well written book. Readers who first encountered Proulx through "The Shipping News" will be pleased to discover that the author's knack for writing provocative and moving prose is alive and well in this 1996 novel. The central theme--the struggle of immigrants to assimilate themselves into American society while maintaining ties with their native culture--will strike a chord with many readers. The device used to explore this theme is a hand-made green accordion, brought to the US by an Italian immigrant in the 19th century. The accordion changes hands numerous times, with each new owner spotlighted in a separate chapter of the book. Fans of good writing will surely enjoy "Accordion Crimes." Most of the stories are dark and troubling. And only a handful of the characters are meant to be likeable. But the vivid storytelling will keep you turning the pages, as will the suspense of discovering the ultimate fate of the little green accordion ... and the treasure hidden inside of it. Those who are squeamish may be put off by Proulx's gruesome means of killing off her characters: suicide by chainsaw, electrocution by worm probe, being crushed under a collapsing cinder-block wall. It's enough to make Stephen King blush. In addition, the book is labeled as "a novel," but it's perhaps more apt to consider it a collection of short stories. As a result, character development and story lines are not as deep as they are in other Proulx novels. Nonetheless, those who read this book will likely enjoy enough of the chapters to make the experience worthwhile.
Rating:
Summary: Unbelievably Macabre
Review: When my book club picked this as a selection I was looking forward to reading another book by the author of "The Shipping News"(which I enjoyed). Unfortunately, this novel was so different in style that it was a complete disappointment. The story follows the history of an accordian as it changes ownership over the years. The concept is a tried and true one(as illustrated in "Hitty, Her First Hundred Years" by Fields), but this book does it no justice. Each of the owners meet their demise or a disaster in horrible ways. I, personally, was not ready for such violence and would not have finished this novel if it wasn't for the book group. If there was a rating of zero stars, this is one book that would warrant it.
Rating:
Summary: Not her best but still a treat
Review: Annie Proulx is hard to beat as a writer who spins yarns and creates moods, places, and characters that live vividly in your mind long after the last capter of her always engrossing books is closed. ACCORDIAN CRIMES, by any other author, would have been cited an unqualified success, but Proulx has spoiled her legion of fans with her other books that intensively dissect characters whose lives she unravels in an inimitable way. In ACCORDIAN CRIMES all her gifts as a writer are intact but we lack a set of characters about whom we care. This book is more of a Canterbury Tales or a Thousand and One Nights with the unifying presence being that of an accordian passing from hand to hand among a fascinating but essentially unrelated group of emigrants. Proulx's immensely satisfying ability to inform us in detail about the most obscure subjects (such as the making and functioning of an accordian) alone satisfies the reader to stay with her journey from century to century. If there is a unifying element here it is the very heartbeat of the Americanization of foreign emigrants. And after all, we all are just that, at varying lengths of living here! A good read, if not up to Proulx's own high standards.
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