I probably should not have requested this one, as it didn't seem to be my kind of thing, but I was swayed by all the five star reviews. After all, who wants to miss out on a great read? Unfortunately, this one is only a so-so read, though the bones of a much better novel are there.

It's 1982, and we meet the cast of characters of the senior play, a cheery, rousing rendition of The Diary of Anne Frank. Hardly the usual high school fare, but the director is anything but usual. An acerbic, unhappy individual, Tyrus Densmore treats his students like his peers, pouring on the risqué remarks, and occasionally going too far with the touching. The kids are a mishmash of high school cliches, boring as hell, and hard to tell apart. Sadly, most of the book is devoted to their lives and antics leading up to The Big Night, and The Bad Thing That Happened.

Cut to 2016. Almost 35 years later, the kids are all grown up, and honestly, a heck of a lot more interesting. AND, it's time for the chickens to come home to roost. While one former student wants to host a party celebrating the career of Densmore, others want everyone to know just what sort of man he really was . . . and they're about to blow up the internet with their confessions.

Though I'm not usually not a fan of flashbacks, but I think this story would have been stronger, and much better told if we had met the characters as adults, and gotten to know them a bit before jumping back in time to the "incident." The present day plot was much so more compelling than the "teenage years."

That's just my thoughts, and my explanation for the lower rating. Obviously, MANY others adored this book.

And . . . in case you thought that Densmore seems a bit overdone, I can personally attest that teachers in the seventies, and early eighties got away with A LOT MORE than they ever would today. I can remember two male teachers standing in the crowded hallway as classes were changing, verbally rating the 12 and 13 year old girls who walked past. Then there was the art teacher who offered to show my friend L. his "one-eyed trouser monster."

He taught there for two decades after I graduated . . .

This is a story about how a single, seemingly small event can change the course or so many lives. In 1982, a group of students at a magnet school in Evanston, outside of Chicago, stage a production of The Diary of Anne Frank. The school’s theater director has long been suspected of being a questionable character, but rules the theater program with an iron fist. When he rejects Declan, the experienced senior who assumes he will get his choice of roles, for a starring role in the production, casts Franklin, an underclass man who is not well known by the other theater students, and then Franklin is seen at the director’s home in a potentially compromising position, the lives of the director and all of the students in the production are set on a new trajectory that will alter the courses of their lives.

The second half of the novel jumps to 2016, and we see the surprising adult lives led by each of the student actors and the director — few of which turned out how they expected. As their lives intersect in surprising ways, they grapple with how the play they did as teenagers sheds light on their and the country’s experiences in the modern age, as some of the play’s themes and cautions seem all too applicable.

I’ve enjoyed all of the author’s previous books. His novel Crossing California is one of my all-time favorites, so I was excited to dive into this one. It shared many of the aspects of his precious works — rotating perspectives among different characters and deep insights into interpersonal relationships and human motivations. The latest novel also used several clever and effective devices: First, a two-act structure that highlighted the ways that most of the character’s adult lives departed, in both good and bad ways, depending on the person from the lives they had imagined in high school — and how even the better than expected outcomes often are bittersweet. I particularly appreciated the juxtaposition between the characters who never were able to move past what happened in high school and those who had, to varying degrees of success, left that all behind — reflecting the two paths so many go down. And second, using the play to highlight the parallels between the events portrayed then and events in 2016 — and how the characters reacted to the modern era in ways they may not have predicted when they were playing the various roles in The Diary of Anne Frank.

Highly recommended!

It is 1982, and a high school outside Chicago is getting ready for its spring play, The Diary of Anne Frank. When the mercurial and troubled theater director chooses not to cast Declan, the senior theater star, in a featured role and instead selects Franklin, it upsets the ecosystem of the students in the theater program in subtle and obvious ways, with consequential impacts on their high school experience and their entire futures. The book then jumps to 2016, and we see how that one decision all those years ago continues to impact almost all of those involved in the play.

This is an interesting and often thought-provoking narrative about the ways seemingly minor events can have large effects and the powerful effects of disappointment when one’s life falls short of expectations. Through the perspectives of different characters and different times, the author creates a well-written and highly engaging book.

Highly recommended!

I found this author’s books ages ago in a public library and positively tore through them. Not a prolific writer, but such a good one. So naturally when I saw his latest come up on Netgalley, I was intrigued…and excited to revisit a past favorite to see how it holds up.
The result is a somewhat mixed bag marred by nostalgia and personal impressions, but then again, that’s any reviews, so then…
Cyclorama is an ambitious, sprawling, competent literary novel that’s easier to appreciate than love. For me appreciation comes from recognizing the complexity of themes, quality of writing, etc. and love comes from personal engagement with the story and its characters. So then, the latter left something to be desired. I didn’t really care for any of the novel’s characters and There. Were. Many. Enough to warrant a personae dramatis.
The basic plot follows a group of teenagers involved in their high school production of a play about Anne Frank under the auspices of a nasty pedo-leaning teacher.
Fast forward forty years to the divisive election year of 2016 and that teacher is turning 77. You, the reader, get to revisit each of the kids now as middle-aged adults to see how their early experiences had echoed and reverberated throughout their life and what sort of people they became.
Langer is a master writer, no question; and his character writing is absolutely first rate, whether you like the characters he is writing or not. The layered complexity and flawed nature of them is laid bare for your perusal and judgement. The nature and nurture collide to create personalities as individual as they are complicated. For that alone, the novel is well worth a read. Is does that thing good/real literature can do splendidly.
Does emotional intelligence on page translate into emotional engagement by the reader? That’s a different and likely highly individualized sort of thing, so user mileage may vary. But this is an undeniably strong book. Thanks Netgalley.

I have read Adam Langer's other books most notably "Crossing California" and " The Washington Story" and have really enjoyed them not only because he effectively and movingly captures growing up, he also places these books in neighborhoods I am familiar with. Cyclorama pulls you in because you are brought back to high school and specifically for the staging of Anne Frank. Langer effectively weaves in all of the high school dynamics of popularity, outsiders, alcohol, a predatory teacher and pulls this all forward into present day as we see these "kids" navigate adulthood. The one challenge I had reading this is there are 10 teens introduced and because I did not read it in one sitting (more like over a week), I sometimes had to refer back to remind myself which "kid" we were talking about in terms of their backstory. But this is just a minor issue because this is so beautifully written and made me reflect -- what role do we each play to stand up to hate/violence? What risks are we willing to take to speak the truth? Langer's use of Anne Frank and then the restaging of it present-day helps us hold up a mirror to ourselves and examine the actions and motivations of the characters. The ending gave me hope - which I really needed right now. I highly recommend this book.

Cyclorama
by Adam Langer
Pub Date: August 2, 2022
Bloomsbury
Thanks to the author, publisher, and Netgalley for the ARc of this book.
* Fiction *contemporary
The deeply moving, propulsive story of ten teenagers brought together by a high school production of The Diary of Anne Frank that will shape and influence the rest of their lives.
Good book!
3 stars

Cycling through history, this absorbing novel draws connections between a group of high-school theater kids in 80’s greater Chicago as they take on Anne Frank’s Diary as a play. Their teacher is a volatile and dark presence scarring many of the students in direct or tangential ways. Early parts trace the characters’ stories at the school while later portions show these very same characters as adults, living their ordinary lives. Langer draws remarkable connections between worlds and every character is vividly imagined. At times the parallels between Anne Frank and the current-day MAGA “build-a-wall” movement feel forced. Nevertheless, a stunner.

Reading this was really a pleasure! I enjoyed all the clever connections to Anne Frank, especially how the play itself was a pivotal moment in all of their lives and they never really lost their connection to the character they played or to the events of that time. Weaving many characters together over decades is no easy task, and I thought this was done in a masterful way. I will definitely recommend this book! It was both enjoyable and interesting.

An exceedingly rare 5 stars from me. Seriously, it takes A LOT for me to give a book 5 stars. This novel focuses on a high school drama teacher, Tyrus Densmore, and the high school cast of a 1982 production of The Diary of Anne Frank. The author does an excellent job of setting the time and place of of the original production of the play, and really delving into the struggles and personalities of the teens. They are fully fleshed out. The novel then moves to recent times, where one of the original cast members is now directing a production of the play, and we see how they have grown up. One of them makes a shocking accusation dating back to 1982. An excellent character study as well as a novel about the abuse of authority and delayed reckoning.

A 1982 stage production of The Diary of Anne Frank forms the backdrop for one of 2022’s best novels, a wry, character-rich study of the complex power dynamics inherent in teacher-student relationships, and the consequential reframing of past actions within our contemporary social context. Every one of the teen cast members revolving in the orbit of their colorful drama instructor, the eccentric Tyrus Densmore, is so fully realized and memorable that one can’t help but connect with them through their early juvenile struggles, and then sympathize when we check in with them in their later adult years, wiser yet infinitely wearier. Adam Langer delivers a thoughtful, heartfelt and humor-filled novel about authority, gaslighting, and the complex, often inadequate, nature of deferred justice. A rare 5 star review from me.