The jacket informs us that Loon Lake is 'a novel by E.L. Doctorow Author of RAGTIME'. Ragtime must have been a hard act to follow. In its day (1975), it was the most highly paid-for novel ever. Doctorow had well over two million dollars in subsidiary-rights advances and a whole generation of readers were introduced by it to the meaning of the word 'hype'. The receipts are still not all in (for instance, the long-postponed film is yet to come). But the 'watershed publishing event' - as Bantam Books hailed it - was a flop. Doctorow could have been forgiven for retiring into prosperous obscurity.

LRB 18 December 1980 | PDF Download