The novel is set in a deliberately vague, ’40s-ish New York when tough-guy unions and corrupt politicians ran the city. Into this noiresque world walks Lila Mae Watson, the first black woman elevator inspector in the union. She is fierce, she is capable (she has the highest accuracy rate in the department) and she is about to be framed. An elevator Watson has inspected free-falls–during the mayor’s campaign visit to a new sky-rise, no less. As an Intuitionist, a member of a group of inspectors who understand elevators on a psychic plane, Lila Mae finds herself in the middle of a conspiracy with more levels than the Empire State. The elevators that Lila Mae loves start to take on an ominous quality. ““There’s an old inspector’s maxim: “An elevator is a grave’.''
““The Intuitionist’’ is full of sly gumshoe references–the fact that our detective is an elevator inspector is itself a pun on inspector–but what makes the novel so extraordinary is the ways in which Whitehead plays with notions of race. ““The black box,’’ as he calls the perfect elevator, is a symbol of Lila Mae’s ambition as a black woman, as well as the limitations placed on her by the powerful men who seek to halt her rise.
Whitehead’s also on the rise. Jonathan Demme is developing ““The Intuitionist’’ for a movie, and Whitehead is on to his next novel: a riff on the myth of John Henry. ““I didn’t want to do another fake mystery novel,’’ he says. ““Because then that would be my shtik, and I wouldn’t want it to be.’’ He needn’t worry. Like Lila Mae, he’s too smart to be caught in a box.
AMY and ISABELLE by Elizabeth Strout(Random House. $22.95). Strout’s lovely, powerful debut novel is a kind of modern-day ““Rapunzel,’’ set in a New England mill town. Isabelle lives with her golden-haired, 15-year-old daughter in suffocating isolation. Then young Amy blooms under the attention of a new math teacher named Mr. Robertson. Inevitably, he pops the creepy question: ““Could I drive you home today?’’ The ensuing affair consumes Amy, enrages Isabelle–and finally forces both to make their way into the world.
Strout, 43, lives in Brooklyn, N.Y., with her husband and daughter. Years ago, when she was starting out, she got the best rejection of her life from New Yorker editor Daniel Menaker: ““He called and said, “We turned down your story, but I think it’s really very good, and I just want to tell you that, whatever you do, don’t stop.’ I mean, it’s embarrassing how much that meant to me.’’ Menaker moved to Random House, and bought ““Amy’’ even when Strout couldn’t find an agent. Advance reviews have been stellar, and independent booksellers–crucial to literary titles–already love the novel. Carol Wald, of Manhattan’s Three Lives & Co. bookstore, says, ““I actually rationed the pages toward the end because I wanted it to last. I’m going to recommend it hand over fist.’’ So are we.
