For more than 70 years until it closed in 1971, Palisades Amusement Park drew crowds to the cliffs above the Hudson River in New Jersey, promising rides, music, carnival food and a chance to escape the pressures of real life. Alan Brennert pays tribute to the park--a beloved part of his own childhood--in a sweeping new novel peopled by a colorful assortment of characters.
The cast of Palisades Park includes many historical figures, such as the Rosenthal brothers, the park's longtime owners. But its plot centers on a fictional family: Eddie and Adele Stopka, who run a french fry stand at Palisades, and their children, Toni and Jack, who grow up among the park workers. Impulsive tomboy Toni is enchanted by the feats of the performing high divers, while her mother dreams of escaping the grease and sweat to pursue a career on the stage.
The park prospers through the Depression, providing a much-needed escape for locals and tourists alike. But World War II, several later conflicts and the beginning of the civil rights era bring changes for both the park and the Stopkas. Brennert deftly intertwines the two stories, tracing the rise of Toni's diving career and the park's shifting fortunes. Readers of Brennert's previous novels (Honolulu; Moloka'i) will enjoy several nods to Hawaii, and readers old and new will appreciate his cast of working-class characters, many of them dreamers. Told in vivid prose with a hint of nostalgia, Palisades Park is a beguiling love letter to a vanished world. --Katie Noah Gibson, blogger at Cakes, Tea and Dreams