"A Vist from the Goon Squad" by Jennifer Egan

Author Jennifer Egan puts into her characters’ consciousness a purported saying that time is a goon, and the rough treatment these denizens have at the hands of time makes up the plot of this novel. This story represents, in fact, one long, indiscriminate, and mostly rude visit from the goon which is time. We witness youngsters in the ‘80s punk world: they wear their partisanship like a safety pin piercing, swearing fealty to this band, that singer, the true-to-the-cause club they all go to. We encounter a varied cast, but at the center are Bennie and Sasha, the impresario/record producer and his assistant.

Egan presents her diverting cast as it careens from one crisis to the next - I try to part the thicket, and succeed only partially. Bennie and Sasha occupy central roles, as I said, and we get Bennie’s wife Stephanie and his unending series of mostly unidentified  paramours; Stephanie works for a PR executive who goes by the moniker La Doll, until an unmitigated disaster at a gala event forces her to change her name and join the soft underbelly of the publicist’s ilk. She even has her nine year-old daughter Lulu along when they witnesses a Latin American dictator fly into a rage and arrest an American film actress, who seems doomed to find an ignominious end.

The moral assumptions these characters make strike one with their callousness and calculation, although some characters swing well to the other end of the spectrum, a dizzying and unpredictable spectacle. Don’t look for a unified plot here. Look instead for sweep of time, for characters in the midst of crisis and resolution, and especially find dark humor and sharp observation of sketchy morals at work.

We bounce around in time, a little, but mostly time is the inexorable force mutating people’s appearance and approach to life, the insensate goon who pays everyone a visit everywhere. It’s hard to know whether to recommend this vivid but disjointed work. By all means pick it up if the ‘80s punk scene fascinates you; if outrageous and life-threatening scenes get your heart a-pumping; if watching the ravages and regrets from time’s irresistible march speaks deeply to you, this is the place to go. Otherwise, pass.