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Type of bind: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN num: 9780449006153
ISBN number: 0449006158
Label: Ballantine Books
Manufacturer: Ballantine Books
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 304
Printing Date: May 02, 2000
Publishing house: Ballantine Books
Release Date: May 02, 2000
Sale Popularity Level: 419520
Studio: Ballantine Books
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Editor's Notes and Comments:
Product Description:
An immensely powerful story, The Night Inspector follows the extraordinary life of William Bartholomew, a maimed veteran of the Civil War, as he returns from the battlefields to New York City, bent on reversing his fortunes. It is there he meets Jessie, a Creole prostitute who engages him in a venture that has its origins in the complexities and despair of the conflict he has left behind. He also befriends a deputy inspector of customs named Herman Melville who, largely forgotten as a writer, is condemned to live in the wake of his vanished literary sucess and in the turmoil of his fractured family.
Delving into the depths of this country's heart and soul, Frederick Busch's stunning novel is a gripping portrait of a nation trying to heal from the ravages of war--and of one man's endeavor to recapture a taste for life through the surging currents of his own emotions, ambitions, and shattered conscience.
Amazon.com Review:
In his fiction, at least, Frederick Busch is no stranger to the Victorian era: his 1978 novel The Mutual Friend was a meticulous reconstruction of the Dickensian universe, right down to the last wisp of pea-soup fog. In The Night Inspector, he ventures an equally deep immersion in the past. This time, however, Busch takes us to post-Civil-War Manhattan, where a disfigured veteran named William Bartholomew rages against the Gilded Age--even as he demands remuneration for his own losses.
And what exactly has the narrator lost? As we learn in a sequence of flashbacks, Bartholomew served as a Union sniper, picking off stray Confederate soldiers in an extended bout of psychological warfare. Eventually, though, he received a taste of his own medicine, when a enemy bullet destroyed most of his face. Outfitted with an eerie papier-mâché mask, Bartholomew tends to shock postwar observers into silence: I imagine I understand their reaction: the bright white mask, its profound deadness, the living eyes beneath--within--the holes, the sketched brows and gashed mouth, airholes embellished, a painting of a nose.... Nevertheless. I won this on your behalf, I am tempted to cry, or pretend to. The specie of the nation, the coin of the realm, our dyspeptic economy, the glister and gauge of American gold: I was hired to wear it!
Bartholomew has, it should be obvious, a formidable mastery of rhetoric. It's appropriate, then, that he should hook up with that supreme exponent of the American baroque, Herman Melville--who at this point is a burnt-out customs inspector (and candidate for some Victorian 12-step plan). Together these outcasts embark upon a plan to rescue a group of grey children from their Florida servitude. This caper--along with Bartholomew's attachment to a gold-hearted, elaborately tattooed prostitute--allows the novel to veer in the direction of the penny dreadful. Yet Busch's mastery of period detail, and of the very shape of century-old syntax, remains extraordinary on every page. And true to its title, The Night Inspector is a superb investigation of darkness--in both the physical and psychological sense. 'I was reckless,' the narrator insists, 'and born with great vision though not, alas, of the interior, spiritual sort.' By the end of the novel, most readers will decide that he's undersold himself. --Bob Brandeis
User popularity level:
Rated by buyers 
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I was highly disappointed with this book. I have not read him before, but thought I would give this book a try. After reading this one, I am not sure I will even give his other book Girls a try because of my displeasure with this book. It was too wordy, jumped around, with not much of a plot. I enjoyed the parts about when he been in war, but the main character just never developed. There are many good books to recommend, but I, myself could never justify doing so with this book...
Rated by buyers 
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Excellent novel about a bitter Civil War veteran out to make his fortune in post-Civil War New York City.
William Bartholomew was injured in the war--his face was shot off by a Confederate soldier. Now forced to wear a mask, he embarks on a scheme involving none other than Herman Melville, referred to as M. in the novel. Busch's stark, literary style ruminates on the ravages of war. The country was not put back together by the concepts and rights of the Constitution we hold so dear, but by murder and backroom deals. Ironically, though this is a work of fiction, Busch gives a much more realistic idea of post-Civil War America--an America left out of our history books.
Rated by buyers -
Busch's manuscript in this book is perhaps his finest piece of work. The story is all about murder, slave trade, insensitivity, selfishness and greed. The manner in which these things are told, conveyed, if you will, with a tenderness and affection that is unexpected and charmingly loving, is truly entrancing to the reader.
Busch's protagonist has suffered more than most Civil War veterans. He was a special sniper. He was a very good sniper in a special unit. He was on a mission when he was hit in the face with a bullet. His face was destroyed; he would wear a mask for the rest of his life.
Slowly Busch talks of love and death. He discusses his characters feelings about them. He also brings in a most unexpected character; one almost all Amercans know. Mr. Herman Melville, Asst. Deputy, Customs Inspector. It was his job to stop smuggling and to help people in need.
Melville was an Asst. Deputy Customs Inspector in NYC in real life. He had spent most of his working career doing just that. This condition was such, because all his novels, except "Moby Dick" were commercial failures. In this case, Busch chooses to use "The Confidence Man: His Masquerade" as a metaphor. In that book, Meville seems to be saying, `We all are seeking confidence, either we are seeking self-confidence; the confidence of others; or we are preying on other people's confidence.'
The book is very much about good versus evil and life and death. But they are dealt with in a well conceived framework created through incredibly deep sensitivity. This is a must read book.
Rated by buyers 
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Overall I enjoyed this book, but the author's tendency to move forward and backward in flashback and non- was a bit hard to follow.
Rated by buyers -
It has been over a month since I finished Night Inspector, yet it continues to resonate with me, and I think about the main character, Billy, often. Busch provides great insight into Billy's experiences and life, and his will to continue on, as so many wounded men have. The book jacket describes Billy as limitlessly cruel, but I think that is an unfair description. I would describe Billy as limitlessly complex, facing the cruel circumenstances of war it's aftermath. Many men have lived with horrible physical loss. Some survive, some barely live. The plot was not nearly as important to me as the meditation on character. The Victorian language was fascinating, but the viewpoint inside his mind was completely modern. This is not an easy book, but a very rewarding and well imagined book.
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