Bandbox: A Novel
Bandbox: A Novel by Thomas Mallon is a first edition published by Pantheon on January 6, 2004. This 320-page work captures the vibrant essence of New York during the Jazz Age, focusing on the wildly successful magazine Bandbox, which reflects the era’s obsessions, from the stock market to gangland murder. The story revolves around the magazine’s flamboyant editor, Jehoshaphat “Joe” Harris, and his eclectic team, including a crime writer, a determined copyboy, and a lovesick correspondent, as they navigate the challenges posed by a rival publication.
Readers will find a narrative filled with comedic crises and dramatic events, including a sabotaged fiction contest, a kidnapping, and encounters with the NYPD vice squad. The plot unfolds through a series of escapades that take the characters from the heights of skyscrapers to the depths of speakeasies, and even to Hollywood and a dinner with Calvin Coolidge. Bandbox presents a rich tapestry of the 1920s, exploring the cultural dynamics and eccentricities of the time while delivering a humorous yet poignant portrayal of a defining decade in American history.
Official synopsis Publisher
From the author of Henry and Clara, a dazzling, hilarious novel that captures the heart and soul of New York in the Jazz Age.
Bandbox is a hugely successful magazine, a glamorous monthly cocktail of 1920s obsessions from the stock market to radio to gangland murder. Edited by the bombastic Jehoshaphat “Joe” Harris, the magazine has a masthead that includes, among many others, a grisly, alliterative crime writer; a shy but murderously determined copyboy; and a burned-out vaudeville correspondent who’s lovesick for his loyal, dewy assistant.
As the novel opens, the defection of Harris’s most ambitious protégé has plunged Bandbox into a death struggle with a new competitor on the newsstand. But there’s more to come: a sabotaged fiction contest, the NYPD vice squad, a subscriber’s kidnapping, and a film-actress cover subject who makes the heroines of Fosse’s Chicago look like the girls next door. While Harris and his magazine careen from comic crisis to make-or-break calamity, the novel races from skyscraper to speakeasy, hops a luxury train to Hollywood, and crashes a buttoned-down dinner with Calvin Coolidge.
Thomas Mallon has given us a madcap and poi-gnant book that brilliantly portrays the gaudiest American decade of them all.
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