Anyone's My Name: A Novel

Rating:
Summary: Anyone . . .
Review: First published in 1953 and reissued in 1998, ANYONE'S MY NAME explores the dark side within us all perhaps as well as any novel written during those 45 years. As the story unfolds, author Seymour Shubin deftly unveils the gradual changes that affect the narrator's personality as events and his own actions conspire against him. The dire consequences arising out of individual judgment, or lack thereof, move Paul Weiler inexorably toward a totally unexpected (in his view) and ultimate fate. First time around, ANYONE'S MY NAME made the New York Times best seller list. One good reason likely springs from the fact that Shubin has written a novel without a single chink in its tightly controlled first point of view. Contemporary writers would do well to study and learn from Shubin's technique. The story's power, however, is contained within the word, "anyone" in the title. Although it is natural to ask ourselves, "How could Paul Weiler be so stupid?" the novelist's skill shows that our smug small lives are far more fragile than we think. ANYONE'S MY NAME illuminates the truth in the saying, "There but for the grace of God go I," as we come to realize that what happened to Paul Weiler really could happen to anyone."

Rating:
Summary: Anyone . . .
Review: First published in 1953 and reissued in 1998, ANYONE'S MY NAME explores the dark side within us all perhaps as well as any novel written during those 45 years. As the story unfolds, author Seymour Shubin deftly unveils the gradual changes that affect the narrator's personality as events and his own actions conspire against him. The dire consequences arising out of individual judgment, or lack thereof, move Paul Weiler inexorably toward a totally unexpected (in his view) and ultimate fate. First time around, ANYONE'S MY NAME made the New York Times best seller list. One good reason likely springs from the fact that Shubin has written a novel without a single chink in its tightly controlled first point of view. Contemporary writers would do well to study and learn from Shubin's technique. The story's power, however, is contained within the word, "anyone" in the title. Although it is natural to ask ourselves, "How could Paul Weiler be so stupid?" the novelist's skill shows that our smug small lives are far more fragile than we think. ANYONE'S MY NAME illuminates the truth in the saying, "There but for the grace of God go I," as we come to realize that what happened to Paul Weiler really could happen to anyone."

Rating:
Summary: A brilliant literary crime thriller
Review: In the early 1950s, Paul Simons writes true detective stories even as he yearns to become a great writer of higher quality work. He is tired of writing at a twelve year old's readability level. His spouse Ginny also desires for Paul to scribe better stuff than the trash he always seems to be writing. She loathes his detective stories, not understanding that they pay the bills.

As Paul digs deeper into the weird world of the killers he writes about, he himself begins to emulate the behavior of his subjects. Soon Paul becomes the target of a police man hunt. However, his descent does not become complete until a writer of true detective stories wants to tell Paul's story to the world.

Originally published in 1953, ANYONE'S MY NAME was written over a decade before the Supreme Court's Miranda ruling. However, unlike many of the books and movies of that era, this novel not only holds up well in the nineties, it feels as if it has been written from today's headlines. Readers have the rare opportunity to see what makes a killer tick before, during, and after the fatal event. This novel is not just a good detective story, it is a great criminology tale that uses the psychology and philosophy of murder as its basis. If you have not had a taste of Seymour Shubin, one of the all time greats, try this novel. Subsequently, the reader will clamor for more of his literature.

Harriet Klausner

Rating:
Summary: Good intentions are not enough
Review: The central idea of this novel is interesting enough: an ordinary man, very much on the side of the "decent people," unable to understand how it is to be on the other side, the side of criminals and outcasts, until he finds himself precisely there, rejected by a society that will not listen and that prefers to view his tragedy in simplistic terms: in this case, that he is a blood-thirsty, lust-driven monster, rather than accepting that he is just a weak man whose only sin was lack of courage, just like so many other men. However, the tone in general is too didactic and in most of the book lacking in sincerity. The author is trying too hard to demonstrate something, and it shows. Only the final part is (and only occasionally) candid and moving, but, alas, too brief. The author takes his time describing the circumstances that lead Paul to his crime, his feelings of remorse and his attempts to escape afterwards, but the end, the epiphany of how it is like to be one of the characters he described too shoddily in his true-crime articles, is too quickly resolved, as if it was too intense for the author to handle. This does not mean that the book is not worth reading; it is fast-paced and quite absorbing, but I just couldn't help comparing it with other, better and less self-conscious books about the world seen through the eyes of a criminal.

Rating:
Summary: Good intentions are not enough
Review: The central idea of this novel is interesting enough: an ordinary man, very much on the side of the "decent people," unable to understand how it is to be on the other side, the side of criminals and outcasts, until he finds himself precisely there, rejected by a society that will not listen and that prefers to view his tragedy in simplistic terms: in this case, that he is a blood-thirsty, lust-driven monster, rather than accepting that he is just a weak man whose only sin was lack of courage, just like so many other men. However, the tone in general is too didactic and in most of the book lacking in sincerity. The author is trying too hard to demonstrate something, and it shows. Only the final part is (and only occasionally) candid and moving, but, alas, too brief. The author takes his time describing the circumstances that lead Paul to his crime, his feelings of remorse and his attempts to escape afterwards, but the end, the epiphany of how it is like to be one of the characters he described too shoddily in his true-crime articles, is too quickly resolved, as if it was too intense for the author to handle. This does not mean that the book is not worth reading; it is fast-paced and quite absorbing, but I just couldn't help comparing it with other, better and less self-conscious books about the world seen through the eyes of a criminal.

Rating:
Summary: A brilliant literary crime thriller
Review: This is a beautifully written novel exploring the issue of what could make an ordinary man become a murderer. Although it was written in the fifties it could have been written yesterday. I enjoyed this book tremendously and look forward to reading the rest of Seymour Shubin's books.