Right from the very first page of this book, when WW1 soldier Lamar Jimmerson is convinced to pay $200 for the secret magisteria of the legendary Gnomon Society by a man who is variously called Nick from Turkey or Mike from Egypt or Jack from Syria or Robert from Malta, Portis sets up a great story with fascinating characters.
I think it's mostly due to the brilliantly intimate way that Portis sketches his characters, who usually fall into two main archetypes: credulous yokels and self-confident hustlers. Since plenty of non-natives from have written great books both set in and about the US, it's worth thinking about why Portis' works get grouped in with Mark Twain's and not Vladimir Nabokov's. Obviously the fact that it's set in America makes it American in some way, but I think what those reviewers are trying to get at is that there's something about the way Portis presents the events in his book that a foreigner just couldn't replicate. I agree with that sentiment, although I really can't say why. "What makes an American novel? What makes a great novel? And what makes the Great American Novel? Masters of Atlantis isn't the Great American Novel, that elusive white whale of navel-gazing twentieth century writers, but it is great, and, to judge by the jacket copy on every single one of his books, extremely American. Soon he is basking in the lore of lost Atlantis, convinced that his mission on earth is to administer to and extend the ranks of the noble brotherhood. It's the Codex Pappus - the sacred Gnomon text. Stationed in France in 1917, Jimmerson comes across a little book crammed with Atlantean puzzles, Egyptian riddles, and extended alchemical metaphors.
Lamar Jimmerson is the leader of the Gnomon Society, the international fraternal order dedicated to preserving the arcane wisdom of the lost city of Atlantis.
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