Dreamland (P.S.) by Kevin Baker
Everybody Say "Cheese"
Kevin Bakers Dreamland is the kind of novel that begins with a two-page
list of characters and ends with a nine-page glossary. In between, this
vast, sprawling carnival of a book takes in Coney Island and the Lower
East Side, midgets and gangsters, Bowery bars and opium dens, even
Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung. It is, in short, a novel as big, lively, and
ambitious as Gotham itself, and if you can stomach some of the more
garish local color, its every bit as much fun. Set at the turn of the century,
in a New York as polyglot as any city on earth, Dreamland opens with an
act of misplaced--and very stupid--compassion. Eastern European
immigrant Kid Twist intervenes when villainous gangster Gyp the Blood is
on the verge of murdering a young newsboy for sport. But surprise: thats
no street urchin--thats Trick the Dwarf, self-proclaimed Mayor of Little City
and a Coney Island tout, who dresses up as a boy, he says, as a way I
had of leaving myself behind. Trick hides Kid Twist in the hind parts of the
Tin Elephant Hotel; Kid Twist meets Esther Abramowitz, impoverished
seamstress and labor agitator, then falls in love; Trick woos Mad Carlotta,

a three-foot beauty who thinks shes the Empress of Mexico; and Freud
and Jung sail for America, where they squabble about psychoanalysis.
There are also a few subplots involving police corruption, Tammany Hall,
and the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire--but whos counting? Suffice to say that it
all really does come together in the end, and you wont be bored for one
step of the way. Baker served as chief historical researcher for Harold
Evanss The American Century, and its clear that he put his time there to
good use; Dreamland is full of vivid historical detail, from Lower East Side
slang to the lyrics of popular songs. If this is middlebrow entertainment, its
middlebrow in the same way as Dickens: extravagantly plotted, elegantly
written, and compassionate to the core. --Mary Park
Personal Review: Dreamland (P.S.) by Kevin Baker
What author Baker has composed is a photograph album with snapshots-
in-time of Brooklyn's Coney Island and Manhattan's Lower East Side in the
years surrounding 1910. What a cast of characters it is: the freaks of the
Coney Island sideshows, the Orthodox Jews of the Bowery, crooked
politicians, Thomas Edison, Drs. Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung,
prostitutes, gamblers, sweatshop owners, labor organizers, and on and on.
It's very reminiscent of the best of E.L. Doctorow. Not to worry about the
large cast, Baker thoughtfully presents a "dramatis personae" of 40 of the
most prominent characters to help the reader keep everyone in their place.
The dialogue is colorful, the descriptions fill the mind's eye with interesting
detail, the plots and subplots captivate the reader and make this a
compelling read. Baker admits he plays a little loose with time chronology,
but as he asserts, it's a novel, not history. It's a fascinating look at a
spellbinding part of America during one of its most colorful eras. It's filled
with double-crossers, lovers, fires, and foibles. Having read this book, I
can't wait to read Baker's Paradise Alley.
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