James McBride, _The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store_

 I WAS A little irritated by a misstep in Chapter 17, "The Bullfrog." Most of the chapter is the dialog of a meeting of the chevry ("the men's group that decided important matters at the temple") of a Jewish congregation in Pottstown, Pennsylvania. The meeting occurs, we are told on p. 207, in 1936. But on p. 208, in the conversation before the meeting actually gets down to business, notice is taken that "Paul Hindenburg had chosen a young Austrian named as Adolph Hitler to serve as chancellor"--but that happened in early 1933. Are the men of the chevry years behind on the news, or did the author and his editors just not catch the problem?

The latter, I suspect. McBride does seem really interested in  the 1930s, so far as that goes. There was a presidential election in 1936, but the novel does not mention Alf Landon or Franklin Roosevelt, nor any New Deal program. No one listens to the radio. No one mentions Will Rogers or Shirley Temple. No one mentions the Yankees' amazing rookie, Joe DiMaggio. No one mentions Satchel Paige. Pottstown seems to be under some kind of giant glass dome separating it from the rest of the USA, save when someone needs to make a trip to Philadelphia.

Oh, well. I guess a novel set in the 1930s doesn't really have to mention  the 1930s, and McBride is clearly more interested in the Jewish and the Black populations of Pottstown, who are united in their resistance to the oppressive practices of the Klan-joining population of Pottstown. They cooperate to spring a deaf orphaned Black 12-year-old, Dodo, from a nearby state institution for the disabled, Pennhurst, which has a reputation for cruelty and mistreatment, especially as practiced by a guard known as Son of Man.

Why does Son of Man call himself Son of Man? What made him such a predator? What is his relationship to Nate Timblin, who plays a crucial role in the plan to spring Dodo? We never find out, unfortunately.

The novel does have its virtues, though. Chona Ludlow, one of the Jewish characters, is a beacon of light and righteousness, an embodiment of the Kabbalistic principle of tikkun olam. The chapters narrated from the point of view of Dodo are brilliant.

A likable book in lots of ways. But I can't tell why McBride bothered specifying that it takes place in 1936.