Await Your Reply

Awards

2010 Morning News Tournament of Books Nominee

Review-A-Day

"Chaon's timing couldn't be better: Await Your Reply arrives Tuesday, a week after the Justice Department indicted three men (two of them Russian) for the theft of more than 130 million credit card numbers in what is said to be the biggest case of computer fraud and identity theft in U.S. history. If you want to get into the heads of the perpetrators, this book is a place to start." Edward Nawotka, The American Statesman (read the entire American Statesman review)

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mgrenon, January 2, 2011 (view all comments by mgrenon)
Probably the only book that I reread immediately after reading it for the first time.

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gbrackin047, April 18, 2010 (view all comments by gbrackin047)
Await Your Reply by Dan Chaon was one of the most intriguing novels I have read in a long time. From the very beginning of the book, he gets the reader involved by using short interesting chapters. I could not help myself from being completely drawn into the book from the very beginning. After every chapter, I could not wait to start the next one and learn what was going to happen. The book switches off and on with three different stories. So, after every chapter the reader is left wondering what is going to happen three chapters from now. I just had to keep reading the book to find out what was happening in what seemed like each individual story.

In all the stories, there are two main characters the reader learns about. One is about a dad and his son, one is about a student and her teacher, and the final one is about two brothers who are twins. The stories do not particularly seem to intertwine at the beginning of the book, but as the stories go on connections begin to occur. All three of the stories have their own drama and intrigue that make them especially interesting and relatable too. The first one is about what it would be like to find out that you were adopted and leave your boring old normal life behind for something more interesting. The second story is about what it would be like to fall in love with a high school teacher, and when you graduate run off with him to a better richer life. The final story is about what it would be like to have a crazy twin brother who left home one day, and who you may never see again.

As I read each individual interesting story, I found myself wanting to learn more and more about the interesting characters created by Dan Chaon. Every character has that little something special that draws the reader deeper and deeper into the mystery of the book. The rebellious college student who leaves the normal, safe life to lead a life of crime, the orphaned high school student who falls in love with a young teacher who is rich and can take her away from it all, or the twin brother who wastes away his twenties looking for his brother. All the characters have their own qualities that everyone should be able to relate too.

One thing I especially liked about the book was that Dan Chaon presents a unique way of ordering his book. He does not take the common simple chorological approach, but uses a sort of flashback method. It helps the reader understand the current thought process of the main characters by looking into the past occurrences for important detail. This method helped keep me interested in how the main characters got to their current situations, and what their thought processes were. I personally have always liked the third person point of view which Chaon uses. It helps me understand the point of view of all the main characters and where they are coming from. Chaon shows his experts ability to write in the third person point of view in this novel. I like it writers such as Dan Chaon go inside the characters head to create an even more vivid picture of the characters.

The best part of the book does not come until the end when the author finally reveals the true connections that the characters in each story have with each other. It is absolutely fascinating to think about what I just read and realize the connections were there the whole time. As the reader reads a long he or she can definitely recognize similarities like the aspect of crime and worry in each specific story. All the characters seem to looking for their true identity somehow. In each of the stories inside the novel, the characters create face identities to live their lives as even if this activity is clearly illegal. Money plays an important role throughout the novel and is driving force behind many of the characters wanting to create new identities.

Await Your Reply has everything a really good novel needs. It has hidden connections, real world issues, crime, twins, death, drugs, money, and people with multiple personalities. Everyone will find something interest during the novel and will have a hard time putting it down until the very end. The reader finds out all good things come to the end eventually and what is it going to be like when they finally do?

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claughman387, April 18, 2010 (view all comments by claughman387)
Dan Chaon’s Await Your Reply is a well written novel that almost anyone can relate to; it contains three unique stories of lost individuals trying to discover their purpose in life. It illustrates the simultaneous attempted reinventing of three people, as the characters are revealed in the story the plot thickens. With every turn of the page you are left guessing about what is to happen next. They all are trying to start a new life, to wipe their dirty slates crystal clean. Follow the suspenseful tale of three individuals as they play a game of hide and seek with the law and their beloved family members. Dan Chaon does an extremely well job of drawing out the suspense in the plot involved with the three characters; Lucy, Ryan, and Miles.
Lucy, a young and naive orphan falls in love with her mysterious history teacher. She is more than enthusiastic when they make their escape in his Maserati from boring old Pompey, Ohio together. As their old life fades away into the night, Lucy is disappointed when her romantic getaway is being in the abandoned Lighthouse Motel. She finds herself stuck in the middle of nowhere Nebraska without any civilization around her, her love story starts to crumble in its entirety. Lucy soon finds out that her prince charming is really a criminal, a devil in disguise, a side of him she has never seen begins to appear. She is slow to realize the “mysterious” part of him isn’t a good mysterious; it’s really a secret life of money laundering. Instead of running the opposite direction from his criminal activities, she lingers around longing for the feeling of being rich, something she has yet to experience in her life. Read as she ponders being his partner in crime to get a piece of his enormous fortune or if she heads back to Ohio and leaves this life of criminal activity behind her.
Ryan a college student struggling to find himself, leaves everything his adoptive parents forced upon him behind, he just vanishes one day from college. He leaves his comfy lifestyle without a trace and is presumed dead, however he is recreating himself in a life of fake identities. Under constant pressure by his adoptive parents not to become like his biological father, Jay, he finds himself right along side of him participating in the same mischievous criminal activities. He runs away from his problems at home and college only to find himself jittery, anxious, and unable to relax. Read the novel to see the story unwind as Ryan struggles to find his place in life, and how with every new fake identity, and disguise he loses himself a little more.
Every since they were little Miles and Hayden planned crazy adventures, however Hayden begins to live out their childhood dreams in his very real adult life. Hayden was always the smarter, easier to talk to twin, and once again Miles finds himself in his twin brother’s footsteps. Miles spends his whole life trying to understand where his schizophrenic brother, Hayden is. Always one step behind Hayden, he travels from here to there following crazy clues, emails, and phone messages left by a crazed Hayden. For ten years, Miles participates in this game, it’s no wonder Miles begins to wonder if he is the crazy one. With every fake name, new location, and dead end, Miles is left hopeless but pick up this novel to read how his determination to bring his twin brother home plays out.
Await Your Reply is an outstanding book, and a very easy read. The novel draws you in from the start with the three very well designed characters. A very well written novel you can almost see yourself right there with Miles, Lucy and Ryan. With every twist and turn of each character you are drawn deeper and deeper into the novel. An interesting part of the novel is how Dan Chaon incorporates the three separate people to intertwine throughout their trials and tribulations, read the novel to see how Dan incorporates this into his incredible work of literature. It’s a must read! To Find out whether Lucy chooses to be her teacher’s sidekick in money laundering, or if Ryan finds himself happy in a life of fake identities, or to finally find out if Miles succeeds in outsmarting Hayden in following the endless trail clues to find him? Will their lifestyles of deceit and crime finally catch up with them? The only way to find out is to sink your teeth into the novel Await Your Reply by Dan Chaon.

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Product Details

ISBN:

9780345476029

Subtitle:

A Novel

Author:

Chaon, Dan

Publisher:

Ballantine Books

Subject:

General

Subject:

Identity theft

Subject:

General Fiction

Copyright:

2009

Publication Date:

20090825

Binding:

Hardback

Grade Level:

General/trade

Language:

English

Pages:

336

Dimensions:

9.50x6.36x1.00 in. 1.32 lbs.