Jim Crace is a heck of a writer, always entertaining and deep, in a good way. Whenever he publishes a novel I pick it up. I root for him not only because I enjoy his books, but also because he's an underdog in the literary pack.

I always root for the underdog. No matter who's playing. I support whichever team is behind in points.

Jim Crace writes novels that consistently win awards and stake out new literary ground, but sell at best modestly. He has been short-listed for the Booker prize, received the Whitbread First Novel Award, the E. M. Forster Award, and the Guardian Award. Most recently he won the National Book Critics Circle Award.

That "Circle" of book critics becomes ever smaller. Well-established book critics are losing jobs and space in newspapers and magazines across the country. More underdogs to root for.

I can guess why Crace's novels so far have not been hot stuff at the cash wrap counter.

His novel Being Dead depicts an elderly British couple slowing falling apart on a beach. By falling apart, I mean decomposing, after death by mugging. This is not a theme calculated to appeal to the distracted assistants who choose titles for, say, Oprah's book club. Discerning readers, however, will pay attention to a writer willing to take on such a distasteful subject and turn it into the highest art.

"Anyone who found them there, so wickedly disfigured, would nevertheless be bound to see that something of their love had survived the death of cells. The corpses were surrendered to the weather and the earth, but they were still a man and wife, quietly resting; flesh on flesh; dead, but not departed yet."

I read Being Dead some years ago, and it remains vivid in my memory, as does Quarantine and other Crace books. A NY Times book reviewer once wrote, "It's not clear to me why Jim Crace isn't world famous...." Another reviewer said, " Being Dead will undoubtedly stand out as one of the literary masterpieces of the early 21st century."

In May Doubleday published Crace's latest novel, The Pesthouse. It got good reviews, and has enjoyed modest sales so far.

I read it hungrily and completely inhabited its harrowing, post-apocalypse American world. It's an adventure story that moves its characters through many dangers sometime in the future, centuries after the collapse of the world we know.

In The Pesthouse humans live like medieval peasants, hungry, hounded by bandits, beset by rumor and ignorance. Most believe the tale that things will improve if they make it to the great ocean ships. The American interior is depopulating as emigrants follow perilous paths toward the east coast, unwittingly reversing the historic western march to the Pacific.

When I finished The Pesthouse I sat and wondered: Had I read a lightweight potboiler, or a novel deep enough for philosophers? I had rooted for lead characters Franklin and Margaret to survive, and (spoiler alert) they did.

The book is disarming in its simplicity, and completely convincing. Deeper themes are implicit. Inevitably you will find yourself wondering about your own survival in these days, when there are so many ways our world may end.

It gets you wondering. And it's a great adventure. And it's well crafted. What more enjoyment could a reader wish for, except, perhaps, some commercial success for the author? Even underdogs have to eat.

Aired Sunday July 1, 2007 at 10:55 am and Wednesday July 4, 2007 at 1:00 pm

Orders/Information:

The Pesthouse by Jim Crace. Doubleday hardcover $24.95. ISBN 0385520751.

Being Dead by Jim Crace. Picador paperback $13. ISBN 0312275420. I reviewed Being Dead here: http://www.gallerybookshop.com/bkm/bkm000512.html

In two major recent book reviews of The Pesthouse, The Road by Cormac McCarthy is described as similarly-set and similarly-excellent.

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