The Assistant

Rating:
Summary: Good book, but not great
Review: This book was ok once you get through the beginning, which is very slow. I was also required to read it, so anyone who is reading this review and is also required is probably already thinking that the book is going to be bad, but believe me, once you get into the middle, you want to read more

Rating:
Summary: Strongly written book
Review: This book was one of the few I have read that seem to just flow. Trying to pay attention never was a problem and the story continued as necessary. The character development was incredible, as this was an emotionally endearing novel. The reader feels the pain of the Bober family and the anguish of Frank Alpine when he is humiliated time after time. I highly recommend it.

Rating:
Summary: Malamud's best . A classic of American-Jewish Literature
Review: This is Bernard Malamud's best book. It is written with a kind of understated beauty . The story of Frankie Alpine the assistant who works in the grocery of Morris Bober , and connects himself in suffering with Jewish identity contains the heart of Malamud's 'universalization of his own Jewishness'. The book is a moving story, including the love story between Alpine and the elderly grocer's daughter. Malamud's tender and humane ironic tone informs his warm relation to his characters.
One of those rare books which seems to fully make concrete an abstract ideal of human goodness.

Rating:
Summary: A moving and powerful depiction of obsession and guilt
Review: This novel is a somber glimpse at the life of Frank Alpine, an Italian who is haunted by guilt and seeks only redemption for crimes for which he can't but help to committ. This brilliant work examines the obsession that drives the protagonist to his eventual salvation in the hands of compassion and forgivness. This is a truly remarkable and oddly reminiscent of real life as it captures all the conflicting emotions that often hinder humanity.