The Yiddish Policemen's Union by Michael Chabon

The Pulitzer-Prize-winning author of The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay has brought us a detective novel set in Sitka, Alaska. More specifically, it takes place in an alternate history, in a Jewish state occupying the West coasts of Baranof and Chichagof Islands, on the verge of reversion to the United States.

Some time around 1940, Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes proposed the creation of a refuge in Alaska for European Jews fleeing persecution. Chabon has imagined that the proposal was accepted, and further that the fledgling state of Israel in the promised land has failed. Sitka is a city of four million Jews, and they are all about to need a new place to live, because only a fraction will be allowed to remain after reversion.

Our main character is Meyer Landsman, a detective in the Jewish police force. He is awakened early one morning to find that someone in his building has been shot. He and his partner, Berko Shemets, who also happens to be his cousin, and his supervisor Bina Gelbfish, who also happens to be his ex-wife, spend the rest of the novel trying to unravel the mystery of this murder. Along the way they uncover a sinister plot.

I dare say the high-level trajectory of the story is not spectacularly innovative. What makes it an excellent read are the wonderfully imagined setting and all the details. I spent my entire flight home from California reading the bulk of the book, and then several evenings since finishing it up. Chabon's writing is always excellent, and this book was fun from cover to cover.

Incidentally, I was browsing some lists the other day and was astonished to discover that this book won both the Hugo and the Nebula awards in 2008. The surprise is not because of the quality of the book, but because it had never occurred to me that it might be recognized as science fiction / fantasy. But, it does seem to fit the definition of "speculative fiction", which perhaps explains. I may have to propose it for my reading group.

P.S. I'm setting a dangerous precedent by writing my book reviews out of order. I risk never going back to fill in the books I've skipped. On the other hand, I'm avoiding another danger, namely that the pile of unreviewed books should grow so large that I abandon the project completely. I have five more awaiting review at the moment. Hopefully those will come along soon.