A Model World and Other Stories

Early Chabon is fascinating to me, primarily because he seems so unformed and not-yet-Chabon, though undeniably talented. Plus, it's intriguing to see him still in quotidian, semi-plotless, ambiguous-resolution mode, before he rebelled against all that, and embraced genre. I gave this an extra star for the last section of the book, a series of stories all about one character, a young teen struggling with his parents' divorce and other coming-of-age trials. Nothing groundbreaking, but his uncanny ear and eye make it worthwhile.