FICTION

THE LONGEST MEMORY by Fred D’Aguiar (Pantheon: $20; 144 pp.). Set in 1810 on a Virginia plantation, Guyanese poet Fred D’Aguiar’s ambitious first novel, “The Longest Memory,” is, in many ways an easy, satisfying book. Unfortunately, in spite of a moving plot, unique format and complex themes, “satisfying” is about the best that can be said for it.

“The Longest Memory” tells the story of Whitechapel, an old, completely subjugated slave who inadvertently causes the death of Chapel, his only son, by betraying him as a runaway to the plantation’s owner. It is also the story of everyone surrounding the event; the owner’s daughter who is in love with Chapel, the overseer who brutally whips him, Chapel’s mother, Whitechapel’s great-granddaughter. Even newspaper editorials owners. “The Longest Memory,” is actually a fictional collage with slavery as its unifying idea.

D’Aguiar’s writing is graceful and captivating, yet there is a systemic problem that permeates the entire novel. Nothing sticks. With the exception of Whitechapel, the characters are flat, the images slippery and the plot exists in a hazy no-man’s-land between quotidian reality and myth. Hopefully, D’Aguiar’s future work will be more successful.