Nemesis, by Philip Roth *ONLINE MEETING*

Set in a close-knit Jewish neighborhood in Newark during a terrifying polio outbreak, Roth's final novel, Nemesis, returns to the environs of his youth. It tells the story of Bucky Cantor, a vigorous, dutiful twenty-three-year-old playground director during the sweltering summer of 1944. An athletic young man, he is disappointed with himself because his weak eyes have excluded him from serving in the war alongside his peers. He is ashamed to be seen on the street in civilian clothes.

Although Bucky cannot battle fascism overseas, he finds his own battlefield on the playground as his young charges fall prey to the nemesis of Polio. As the devastating disease begins to ravage his commuity, Roth leads us through every inch of emotion such a pestilence can breed.

Moving between the streets of Newark and a pristine summer camp high in the Poconos, Nemesis tenderly and startlingly depicts the condition of childhood; Cantor’s struggles with fate, his own conscientiousness, and some questionable decisions; and the painful effect that the wartime polio epidemic has on a city, a community and its children.

Roth knows this community well, and in this last book he describes it lovingly.