Book on CD performed by Gibson Frazier
5***** and a ❤

This is a family saga, covering four generations of the Meisenheimer family over a century. It begins in 1904 Hanover Germany when Frederick and Jette meet, fall in love and decide to sail for America, ultimately settling in Beatrice, Missouri, a relatively small town on the banks of the Missouri River. We watch them taken advantage of due to their lack of English, but also helped by the kindness of strangers. One of the first to help them refuses any money but asks that they “become good Americans,” a request they take seriously.

The story is told by Frederick and Jette’s grandson, James, as he looks back at his family’s history. As happens in real life, the family intersects with many of the residents of Beatrice: the doctor, pharmacist, bartender, preacher, banker, funeral director, teachers, farmers, those who are prosperous and those down on their luck. We view history through the lens of one family’s experiences – World Wars I and II, the great depression, floods, the assassination of JFK, etc. The one constant for Frederick and his descendants is music. From opera to jazz to barbershop quartets, music accompanies the events of their lives.

In summary, this is a story of immigrants, a story of quintessential Americans, a story of struggle and triumph and defeat and unabashed joy. I absolutely loved it and as soon as I had finished it I wanted to read it again.

Gibson Frazier does a marvelous job of narrating the audiobook. I only wish that some of the operatic arias could have been sung. But that doesn’t really diminish Frazier’s performance. ( )

I have a hard time figuring out where to begin in my review of this book. I sped through this over the span of two days where I read giant chunks on my train commute. I loved it, but when I started thinking of how I would review the book, I didn't know where to start. I find it very hard to do this book justice without including some gigantic spoilers.

George tells the story of the American experience by following the lives of one family through the generations. And like any good family saga, there are moments of supreme joy, heartbreaking tragedy, and everything in between.

In 1894, a pregnant Jette and Frederick leave Germany for America to escape her disapproving mother and settle in the small town of Beatrice, Missouri. There, they set down roots. The family's story is told by their grandson, James. Four generations of Meisenheimers revolve around a restaurant, which changes over time symbolically with America. And along with this restaurant is the music, which intentionally or not, is also a symbol of the United States.

A Good American doesn't shy away from some of the darker sides of America. George's characters have to deal with World War Two and the soldiers who do not come home, racism, Prohibition, and the Great Depression, to name a few. There are also smaller, closer to home tragedies that pepper the book - but this is not a dark book. Nor is it a happy book. It is a book that captures the heart of American history for the past century or so, where there are good times and bad, but we as a country keep moving forward.

Review copy courtesy of the publisher via Goodreads First Reads program ( )

Hanover, Alemania, 1904. Frederick y Jette son una pareja poco convencional cuyo destino se une al conocerse una cálida tarde de primavera en el parque de Grosse Garten. Frederick posee el don de la música, y, Jette, a pesar de su falta de gracia femenina, una sensibilidad especial para apreciar una delicada melodía. Al escuchar de boca de Frederick un aria de La Bohème de Puccini, reconoce en él al hombre de su vida. Poco después, Jette se queda embarazada, y ante la rotunda desaprobación de su madre, deciden huir juntos y embarcarse en el primer buque que zarpe hacia el Nuevo Mundo. El azar les lleva a Nueva Orléans. La pareja acabará instalándose en una pequeña ciudad de Misuri, donde da comienzo la gran historia de amor y supervivencia de cuatro generaciones de una misma familia.

A really, really good book! The story of a family that immigrated from Germany told through a grandson. Nicely written, easy to fall in love with the full, complex characters. The author has a lovely way with foreshadowing that makes it very hard to put down a story at the end of a chapter. A quote that I must write because it is the reason for the story: "We are all immigrants, a glorious confection of races and beliefs, united by the rock that we live on. As the years wash over us and new generations march into the future, family histories are subsumed into this greater narrative. We become, simply, Americans." Now that I have taken that quote out of context it sounds a little preachy, but the book isn't like that all the way through. It is a story of becoming an American, and all that that means, and having that continue on even when we've forgotten that we all started basically as immigrants. I would still love to have a box on those annoying forms that simply says, American. ( )

This is a saga of a family that ran across 100 years and 4 generations. Starting from a German's couple immigration to U.S. in the early 1900s, the family expanded as it experienced the impact of World War I, segregation, the roaring 20s, the Depression, Prohibition, World War II, Cold War, assassination of JFK, and...popularity of fast food restaurants :P. Each character in each generation had some interesting things happen to them, often in a dramatic or incredible manner that kind of reminds me of One Hundred Years of Solitude. (But unlike One Hundred Years of Solitude, there were no out and out "magical" events. They just seem really incredible and unlikely.) Unfortunately, as the family grows and we move further along to the next generation and the next, I feel the story loses momentum, because all the first and second generation characters that hooked my interest in the first half of the book gradually got old and passed away, and there are just too many descendants to keep track of, and since the family just continues to grow, the story also continues to carry on and struggles find a good place to end.

What's especially interesting for me about this book is that the author of this book lives in the same town I live in, and the setting of this book, although a fictional town, is based on somewhere pretty close to our town. It was pleasant to read about places and sceneries that I seem to recognize. ( )