Ebook466 pages5 hours
Gods of Aberdeen: A Novel
By Micah Nathan
Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
3/5
()
About this ebook
A haunting novel about a brilliant young man who enrolls at a small New England college and becomes entangled in a mysterious death -- and the ultimate scientific quest.
Eric Dunne is a sixteen-year-old academic phenom. Desperate to escape his foster family, Eric graduates early from high school and earns a scholarship to Aberdeen College, a small, prestigious school in northern Connecticut. Aberdeen is a school for the privileged youth of America's elite, an isolated world where hard drinking and hard studying go hand in hand. When Eric is assigned a work-study job with the college's head librarian, Cornelius Graves, Eric begins to hear strange and disconcerting rumors about his new mentor. Despite himself, he is curiously drawn to Cornelius, if only to divine whether it's true that he's searching for the Philosopher's Stone, a mythical substance that supposedly holds the secret to eternal life.
At the same time, Eric's preternatural aptitude for Latin quickly attracts the attention of Arthur Fitch, a charismatic and aloof senior who invites him to become a research assistant for Dr. William Cade, Aberdeen's most celebrated professor. Eric is accepted into Cade's small circle of sophisticated students, all of whom live off campus on Cade's country estate, and soon discovers that his new friends are not just conducting research for Dr. Cade -- they, too, are searching for the Philosopher's Stone. When an alchemical experiment goes fatally wrong, Eric is drawn deeper into the dark secrets surrounding the legendary substance. As the police investigation narrows and Eric gets swept up in Professor Cade's obsession, the tensions on the estate and in Eric's new friendships threaten to explode and, with them, Eric's idealized world.
Like The Secret History and A Separate Peace, Gods of Aberdeen demonstrates the selfishness and savagery that can lie at the heart of the most rarefied academic setting.
Eric Dunne is a sixteen-year-old academic phenom. Desperate to escape his foster family, Eric graduates early from high school and earns a scholarship to Aberdeen College, a small, prestigious school in northern Connecticut. Aberdeen is a school for the privileged youth of America's elite, an isolated world where hard drinking and hard studying go hand in hand. When Eric is assigned a work-study job with the college's head librarian, Cornelius Graves, Eric begins to hear strange and disconcerting rumors about his new mentor. Despite himself, he is curiously drawn to Cornelius, if only to divine whether it's true that he's searching for the Philosopher's Stone, a mythical substance that supposedly holds the secret to eternal life.
At the same time, Eric's preternatural aptitude for Latin quickly attracts the attention of Arthur Fitch, a charismatic and aloof senior who invites him to become a research assistant for Dr. William Cade, Aberdeen's most celebrated professor. Eric is accepted into Cade's small circle of sophisticated students, all of whom live off campus on Cade's country estate, and soon discovers that his new friends are not just conducting research for Dr. Cade -- they, too, are searching for the Philosopher's Stone. When an alchemical experiment goes fatally wrong, Eric is drawn deeper into the dark secrets surrounding the legendary substance. As the police investigation narrows and Eric gets swept up in Professor Cade's obsession, the tensions on the estate and in Eric's new friendships threaten to explode and, with them, Eric's idealized world.
Like The Secret History and A Separate Peace, Gods of Aberdeen demonstrates the selfishness and savagery that can lie at the heart of the most rarefied academic setting.
Author
Micah Nathan
Micah Nathan was born in Hollywood, raised in Western New York farm country, and now lives in Brookline, Massachusetts with his wife. He is a graduate of SUNY Buffalo. Gods of Aberdeen is his first novel.
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Reviews for Gods of Aberdeen
Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
3/5
2 ratings2 reviews
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5First: do I recommend it? Yes. I think maybe others might enjoy it much more than I, and it does have an average 4-star rating on Amazon.com. Not that I always agree with the bulk of the Amazon reviewers. So maybe someone else will get more out of it than me. Set at a small college in Connecticut, the main character of the story is Eric Dunne, who lost his parents at an early age and went on to live with a foster family in the NJ tenements. Deciding that he needed to make something of his life or stay in the tenements forever, Eric goes on to become an academic wunderkind graduating early and getting accepted on scholarship to Aberdeen College. There he is placed in advanced courses, assigned to work in the library, and captures the attention of Art, who is like the TA in his 3rd-year Latin class. Art happens to work for a Professor Cade who is working on a project that he hopes will win him a coveted literary prize, and Art invites Eric to be a part of the team that is helping the Professor with the project. The rest of the group lives in Cade's house for the convenience. Anyway, Eric joins this circle of people and he is immediately aware that there are things going on that no one wants to come out and say. Here, I give the author a LOT of credit...he builds very well the tension in the house that exists between its members so that the reader just has to keep reading to see if these will be resolved and what the underlying "mystery" is that keeps everyone talking around Eric. As Eric comes to know the people better, Art begins to divulge secrets that are being kept and it leads to tragedy.Up to the tragedy, I was just sort of waiting for the big "thing" to hit which gave this book a 4-star rating on Amazon and led some reviewers to call it one of the best books of the year. After the revelation of the tragedy unfolds, this is where the author hits his stride, and after this the book is very very good. It just took WAY too long to get there! I swear, if I had read one more scene of over the top drinking binges I was going to hurl. If the first part of the book had been as good as the last, it would have been an incredible story. Not that I'm a professional critic, but I am a member of the book-buying public, and I think that this author has a great deal of greatness yet to come out so I'll look forward to his second novel.
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Although well written the authors style was distracting and did not mask a rather mundane story. The character's journey lacked depth and I failed to connect him or any of the other characters. The entire story felt forced.
Book preview
Gods of Aberdeen - Micah Nathan
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