"His most musical work of fiction: a polyrhythmic contemplation of time and its effects on passion set in three different eras . . . this is not a book a young man would or could write. There is the sense here of somebody who has seen and considered much, without letting his inner fire cool . . . the ambition and the ability to pull wildly diverse worlds together in a single story is rare. Kennedy, master of the Irish-American lament in works like
Billy Phelan's Greatest Game and
Ironweed, proves here he can play with both hands and improvise on a theme without losing the beat." –
John Sayles, The New York Times Book Review (front page) "Written with such brio and encompassing humanity that it may well deserve to be called the best of the bunch . . . In Mr. Kennedy's Albany, as in William Faulkner's Yoknapatawpha County, the past is never past.
Changó's Beads and Two-Tone Shoes is invigorated by this same blending of new and old, of progress and recurrence . . . there's more shot and incidence in
Changó than in any novel of Mr. Kennedy's since
Legs . . . the style here has the sleekness and strength of good crime noir." –
Sam Sacks, Wall Street Journal "Vivid and charming . . . Kennedy, now in his 80s, is in the embrace of nostalgia as he looks back on the adventures of his youth, and this gives the novel much of its not inconsiderable appeal . . . He is a fluid, engaging prose stylist, and frequently a witty one . . . Kennedy has maintained a high level of achievement throughout [his Albany Cycle], deftly blending comedy and drama as, over the years, he has painted a portrait of a single city perhaps unique in American fiction." –
Jonathan Yardley, The Washington Post "Kennedy's humor is sly and wonderful . . . there's an almost deliriously rich cast of lowlifes here: gun runners, politicians on the make, street- corner agitators, prostitutes, winos . . . Kennedy's] description of Hemingway . . . is well-nigh perfect." –
Kate Tuttle, The Boston Globe "A rich, rewarding novel that reads like a three-act play, spanning the years from 1936 to 1968, with several forms of revolution serving as narrative threads . . . The novel is as intricate as it is brilliant." –Betsy Willeford,
The Miami Herald
