National Book Award Winner is a Winner With Me

Trolling through Budd's staggering collection of books for something to read at the beach, I stumbled across White Noise, a 1985 novel by Don DeLillo.  Naturally, not being as literate as Budd, I had never heard of DeLillo; I now know that he's a great writer and has a new book out, Falling Man.

White Noise is a tale about a family, an airborne toxic event, the fear of death, and what lengths people will go to in order to hide their phobias from their loved ones.  It's also very, very funny.  Jack Gladney, professor of Hitler studies at a Midwestern college is on his fifth marriage to his fourth wife (he married one wife twice), Babette.  They live with their own children and some from numerous previous marriages, including infant Wilder, preteens Steffie and Denise, and 14-year-old Heinrich, a sullen conspiracy-theorist type.  Throughout the first section of the book, in the backdrop of their daily lives lives another set of characters: the voices of television and radio.  " 'Void where prohibited', said the radio."  Jack's ex-wives appear in hilarious anecdotes, along with other children who live apart from him.  His life with Babette includes debating who gets to die first and her reading erotica to him in bed.  Jack and Babette's daughter, Denise, soon discover that Babette is taking some sort of mysterious pill, one which can't be identified through the PDR or Babette's doctor.

The second section of the book involves the Airborne Toxic Event, which is a railroad car accident resulting in the emission of a gaseous cloud.  The town is evacuated; symptoms of exposure include deja vu, and Jack's obsessive fear of death is introduced. These may seem like frightening and dark themes, but DeLillo delivers his dialogue with great levity; I had to read some of the passages out loud to Budd because they were just so damn funny.

After the airborne toxic event, things seem to return to a somewhat normal state for the Gladney family, except we discover that the mysterious pill Babette is taking is an experimental drug to cure her death phobia.  She goes to great lengths to obtain the drug, which ultimately does not have the efficacy she had hoped for, but she arouses a curiosity in Jack to try the drug for himself, all the while trying desperately to dissuade him from that action.

What makes this book really worthwhile in my opinion is the dialogue between characters, particularly the children.  Most of their dialogue consists of a constant barrage of questions, answering questions with questions, revealing their insight and intelligence, showing us that they are fully aware of their parents' limitations.  Another aspect that I found quite interesting is DeLillo's suggestions about American consumerism and its use by people as a way to ward off death.  And yet another interesting aspect - DeLillo used absolutely no profanity in the entire book - not even the word "damn" appears.  For a tale as darkly humorous and layered as this, I found that quite surprising.  It shows that DeLillo has great command of the English language and can weave a fascinating novel that's appropriate for a larger audience.  As a matter of fact, Budd's copy was stamped in the front, "Williams High School" (wherever that is) -- he obviously bought it at one of those book sales he and his father frequent.

I'm not one to give away a whole lot in reviews of books in terms of plot - I think most people can find synopses of the book all over the Internet; I know I did.  I can just tell you that if you want a first-rate read (that's also a quick read) that offers quirkiness, deadpan black humor, fascinating characters and a very thought-provoking ending, White Noise is a good choice.  I'm not surprised that it is highly acclaimed and won the National Book Award.  I'm looking forward to reading more by DeLillo.