Synopses & Reviews
MANY ALARM CLOCKS
Selections from Sy Safransky's Notebook
One man's attempt to understand himself, his wife, his country, and the
human predicament — all before breakfast.
In 1974 Sy Safransky borrowed fifty dollars to start The Sun. As the magazine has
grown, he's become a busy editor and publisher, but he still gets up before sunrise
to write in his journal, occasionally publishing excerpts in a section of the magazine
called Sy Safransky's Notebook. Many Alarm Clocks offers a selection of those excerpts
from the last fifteen years: a lyrical, highly personal, often self-deprecating series of
ruminations on love and loss, faith and doubt, hypocritical Republicans and feckless
Democrats. Safransky writes about loving his wife and about eating too much and
about not meditating enough and about getting older every day no matter how many
vitamins he takes. Sometimes he talks to the dead. Sometimes he argues with God.
He readily admits there's a lot he'll never understand, but he's determined to honor
this brief, mysterious existence by being awake for it.