The Final Solution by Michael Chabon

The Final Solution by Michael Chabon

In The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, prose magician Michael Chabon conjured the golden age of comic books, interwining history, legend and story-telling verve. In The Final Solution, he has condensed his boundless vision to create a short, suspenseful tale of compassion and wit that re-imagines the classic 19th-century detective story.

In deep retirement in the English countryside, an 89-year old man, vaguely recollected by the locals as a once-famous detective, is more concerned with his bookkeeping than his fellow man. Into his life wanders Linus Steinman, nine years old and mute, who has escaped from Nazi Germany with his sole companion: an African grey parrot. What is the meaning of the mysterious strings of German numbers the bird spews out--a top-secret SS code? The keys to a series of Swiss bank accounts? Or do they hold a significance at once more prosaic and far more sinister?

Though the solution to this last case may be beyond even the reach of the once famed sleuth, the true story of the boy and his parrot is subtly revealed to the reader in a wrenching resolution to this brilliant homage. The Final Solution is a work from a master story-teller at the height of his powers.

Michael Chabon is the author of the critically acclaimed novel Wonder Boys, which was adapted into a feature film starring Michael Douglas. His recent novel, The Incredible Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, was named one of the best books of 2000 by Entertainment Weekly. Brilliance Audio sells both of them. He graduated with a B.A. He received his M.F.A. from the University of Pittsburgh.

university of california-irvine He resides in California with his wife and two children.