Houghton Mifflin, 2004, $26, ISBN: 0-618-50928-3, 391 pages, hardback

This over-hyped book touted “Lindberg as President makes nice with the Nazis.” What crap. This book is all about a 10-year old Jewish boy growing up in Newark, New Jersey in the late 1930s. And it might generate interest if you really were a 10-year old in pre-WWII Newark wanting to read your own autobiography. But that's not me.

I found zero interest in the story about the kid, his family, his neighbors, or any one or anything else about this book. I kept reading, hoping for better. Roth has a Pulitzer in his past, so it must be good, right? Blech.

If you want to read about relocations, camps, ghettos, employment constraints, and such, read a history book about the Nazis, like those listed in the book's Postscript, or better yet, read the Diary of Anne Frank.

As for Lindberg, well, he came and went in the book with hardly a ripple. Well, that's unfair. Under his two-minute presidency, the Constitution is scrapped, the Courts bought off, and various laws discriminating against Jews are enacted. Then it's escape to Fuhrersville and FDR becomes president again. Whew! The world is saved for the 10-year-old just in time for Pearl Harbor.

Roth's alternative world falls flat. Knowing what I know now, I wouldn’t buy The Plot Against America from a discount bin.

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