Mercury Pictures Presents

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Maria could. Inevitably, the most creative aspect of any Mercury production was the publicity campaign promoting it. How does the novel treat its bit players? What do you think Marra was trying to say about whose stories matter? How did he illustrate this point? As an adult Maria works for a film studio where she meets many European refugees trying to sell their skills to make a living while suffering discrimination and often under suspicion as ‘enemy aliens’. Marra’s characters are wonderfully drawn. I felt for them. They come from around the world and end up in Los Angeles, but more specifically Hollywood. Some become new people before they arrive, others after they meet new employers and realize what is wanted or needed. Even now, a few days after I finished reading, I can see some of these people in my mind’s eye: one at her desk or with Artie, another always with his camera, still another working on the miniatures, and last, a man I came to really like talking with Bela Lugosi about life in Hollywood.

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Sweeping story that takes the reader from Italy to Hollywood in the 1940s, while exploring the many ways immigrants were penalized during WWII due to xenophobia. It begins in Italy where protagonist Maria Lagana is a young girl. Her father is a lawyer defending citizens against outlandish accusations brought by the fascist government. Due to Maria’s youthful error in judgment, her father is arrested and confined on an island. She and her mother emigrate to the US, where they live with her aunts. She gets a job with Mercury Pictures, a second-tier film studio, and eventually ends up in a production role working with Artie Feldman, the studio head.In Mercury Pictures Presents . . . the story moves between the real war and the better version Hollywood is busy creating. Sometimes tragic, often hilarious’ KAREN JOY FOWLER, Observer, Books of the Year Intimate and sweeping, heartfelt and satirical, one of the funniest and most moving novels I’ve read in a long time.” —Jess Walter They walked out to the lobby, past the miniature of the studio lot. Out on the street, the heat radiating from the asphalt painted sedans and roadsters in impressionist smudges. Due north, the mansion-heaped hillsides looked like a plutocratic favela. When they reached Artie’s Lincoln, he gave her a letter. “Do me a favor. Get this in today’s mail, will you?” Where’s the statement you plan to read before Congress?” Maria asked. “I’ll edit it this afternoon.”

Mercury Pictures Presents: A Novel by Anthony Marra Mercury Pictures Presents: A Novel by Anthony Marra

German was the language Anna thought, counted, dreamed, prayed, and cursed in; it was lovely to remember that it could be beautiful, even if she knew Germany too well to ever speak German beautifully again." Later, she helped the U.S. military in its war effort against Germany. How does the novel treat its bit players? What do you think Marra was trying to say about whose stories matter? Is there a minor character that really appealed to you?A must-read debut! Meet Elizabeth Zott: a "formidable, unapologetic and inspiring" (Parade) scientist in 1960s California whose career takes a detour when she becomes the unlikely star of a beloved TV cooking show in this novel that is "irresistible, satisfying and full of fuel. It reminds you that change takes time and always requires heat" (The ... For years, Maria had devised strategies for smuggling the profane beneath the most sensitive censorial snouts. At her best, she passed more colorful bullshit than Babe the Blue Ox. Not only is Mercury Pictures Presents a fabulous story, it’s Anthony Marra’s intriguing style of writing and his unlikely descriptions that makes the novel so entertaining and thought provoking. New York Times reviewer Matthew Specter provides this example from the book: A rusted-out rowboat decaying on a bank is presented as “a visual index of local fungi and a nursery for deciduous saplings.” Both clever and artful, Marra’s writing aptly reflects the characters of the story. I loved the first half of the book and thought it worthy of 5 stars. My enthusiasm waned as the book got lengthier and more involved. The book ended on a stronger note with its epilogue. The epilogue provided a satisfying closure to the novel; I enjoyed how it tied up loose threads about the more major characters and explained where they were in their lives. And Maria had evolved by then to have more warmth and charm. Fifteen years later, on the eve of America's entry into World War II, Maria is an associate producer at Mercury Pictures, trying to keep her personal and professional lives from falling apart. Her mother won't speak to her. Her boss, a man of many toupees, has been summoned to Washington by congressional investigators. Her boyfriend, a virtuoso Chinese American actor, can't escape the studio's narrow typecasting. And the studio itself, Maria's only home in exile, teeters on the verge of bankruptcy.