Synopses & Reviews
Writing about conspiracy theory in
Libra , government cover-ups in
White Noise , the Cold War in
Underworld , and 9/11 in
Falling Man , “DeLillo’s books have been weirdly prophetic about twenty-first century America” (
The New York Times Book Review ). Now, in
Point Omega , he takes on the secret strategists in America’s war machine. .
In the middle of a desert “somewhere south of nowhere,” to a forlorn house made of metal and clapboard, a secret war advisor has gone in search of space and time. Richard Elster, seventy-three, was a scholar—an outsider—when he was called to a meeting with government war planners. They asked Elster to conceptualize their efforts—to form an intellectual framework for their troop deployments, counterinsurgency, orders for rendition. For two years he read their classified documents and attended secret meetings. He was to map the reality these men were trying to create. “Bulk and swagger,” he called it. .
At the end of his service, Elster retreats to the desert, where he is joined by a filmmaker intent on documenting his experience. Jim Finley wants to make a one-take film, Elster its single character—“Just a man against a wall.” .
The two men sit on the deck, drinking and talking. Finley makes the case for his film. Weeks go by. And then Elster’s daughter Jessie visits—an “otherworldly” woman from New York—who dramatically alters the dynamic of the story. When a devastating event follows, all the men’s talk, the accumulated meaning of conversation and connection, is thrown into question. What is left is loss, fierce and incomprehensible..
Review
"An icy, disturbing and masterfully composed study of guilt, loss and regret — quite possibly the author's finest yet." Kirkus Reviews
Review
"Though it be but brief, DeLillo's latest offering is fierce. An excellent nugget of thought-provoking fiction that pits life against art and emotion against intellect." Library Journal
Review
"[T]his slim novel is rich with ideas about objectivity and complicity, and time and transformation. Its subject is a satisfying next step from DeLillo's 9/11-themed Falling Man" Booklist
Synopsis
From one of the country's greatest living writers comes a brief, unnerving, and hard-hitting new novel about a secret war adviser and a young filmmaker.
Synopsis
Don DeLillo has been weirdly prophetic about twenty-first-century America (the
New York Times Book Review). In his earlier novels, he has written about conspiracy theory, the Cold War and global terrorism. Now, in
Point Omega, he looks into the mind and heart of a defense intellectual, one of the men involved in the management of the country's war machine.
Richard Elster was a scholar — an outsider — when he was called to a meeting with government war planners, asked to apply ideas and principles to such matters as troop deployment and counterinsurgency.
We see Elster at the end of his service. He has retreated to the desert, somewhere south of nowhere, in search of space and geologic time. There he is joined by a filmmaker, Jim Finley, intent on documenting his experience. Finley wants to persuade Elster to make a one-take film, Elster its single character — Just a man and a wall.
Weeks later, Elster's daughter Jessica visits — an otherworldly woman from New York, who dramatically alters the dynamic of the story. The three of them talk, train their binoculars on the landscape and build an odd, tender intimacy, something like a family. Then a devastating event throws everything into question.
In this compact and powerful novel, it is finally a lingering human mystery that haunts the landscape of desert and mind.
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About the Author
Don DeLillo, the author of fifteen novels, including Underworld, Falling Man, White Noise, and Libra, has won the National Book Award, the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, the Jerusalem Prize for his complete body of work and the William Dean Howells Medal from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. In 2010, he was awarded the PEN/Saul Bellow Prize. The Angel Esmeralda was a finalist for the 2011 Story Prize and the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction. In October 2012, DeLillo receives the Carl Sandburg Literary Award for his body of work.