--- title: Review: Jennifer Egan's Exquisitely Written Manhattan Beach description: Jennifer Egan's new novel Manhattan Beach is more conventional in that it’s a linear, historical narrative set circa World War II. canonical: https://time.com/4970290/jennifer-egan-manhattan-beach/ author: Sarah Begley article:opinion: true article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-10-05T11:13:28.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T17:44:36.241Z article:section: Ideas og:title: Jennifer Egan’s ‘Manhattan Beach’ Offers a Heroine for Our Time og:description: It’s more linear than inventive, but just as satisfying og:url: https://time.com/4970290/jennifer-egan-manhattan-beach/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt5426f75cf6cb98bc/6988e09ffb4eaca282894035/manhattan-beach-book-jennifer-egan-review.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: manhattan-beach-book-jennifer-egan-review og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Jennifer Egan’s ‘Manhattan Beach’ Offers a Heroine for Our Time twitter:description: It’s more linear than inventive, but just as satisfying twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt5426f75cf6cb98bc/6988e09ffb4eaca282894035/manhattan-beach-book-jennifer-egan-review.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Review: A Heroine for Our Times in Jennifer Egan's _Manhattan Beach_ by [Sarah Begley](https://time.com/author/sarah-begley/) ## Sarah Begley Oct 5, 2017 11:13 AM UTC  by [Sarah Begley](https://time.com/author/sarah-begley/) ## Sarah Begley Oct 5, 2017 11:13 AM UTC Jennifer Egan joined the who’s who of American letters in 2011 when she won a Pulitzer for _A Visit From the Goon Squad_, an interlinked-story-collection-as-novel that bucked more than a few conventions. Her new novel _Manhattan Beach_ is more conventional in that it’s a linear, historical narrative set circa World War II. It’s a less inventive book, but many readers will find it more satisfying. _Manhattan Beach_, named for the neighborhood in Brooklyn, begins when Anna Kerrigan is almost 12 years old, tagging along with her father to a mysterious man’s seaside home. Already there is a plucky danger about her. When the narrative shoots ahead seven or eight years, we find her at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, working along with the other wartime women to measure construction parts. Soon, she becomes the first female diver to repair ships. The work is risky and physically punishing, but also exhilarating: “like flying, like magic–like being inside a dream,” Anna thinks during her first dive. (Some of Egan’s descriptions of breathing under a 200-lb. suit are just as breathtaking for the reader.) But all is not so lovely: Anna’s father has abandoned the family, her mother is solely devoted to Anna’s severely disabled sister, and the mysterious man resurfaces in an unexpected way. Though the prose is exquisite, Egan never lets it get in the way of the story. In bouts of glamour, adventure and violence, she gives the narrative a cinematic feel, while grounding it in Anna’s realistic frustrations with society. She wants to be “a different kind of girl,” but not that kind of girl. Though “maybe those kinds of girls were simply girls who’d no one to tell them they were not those kinds of girls.” Anna is indeed a different kind of girl. Though she is rooted in her historical setting, readers of today will find her story of daring and persistence deeply resonant. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"OpinionNewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4970290/jennifer-egan-manhattan-beach/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4970290/jennifer-egan-manhattan-beach/"},"headline":"Review: A Heroine for Our Times in Jennifer Egan's Manhattan Beach","datePublished":"2017-10-05T11:13:28.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T17:44:36.241Z","description":"Jennifer Egan's new novel Manhattan Beach is more conventional in that it’s a linear, historical narrative set circa World War II.","url":"https://time.com/4970290/jennifer-egan-manhattan-beach/","keywords":["Books"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt5426f75cf6cb98bc/6988e09ffb4eaca282894035/manhattan-beach-book-jennifer-egan-review.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Sarah Begley","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/sarah-begley/"}],"articleSection":"Ideas","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt5426f75cf6cb98bc/6988e09ffb4eaca282894035/manhattan-beach-book-jennifer-egan-review.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"manhattan-beach-book-jennifer-egan-review","caption":"manhattan beach book review jennifer egan","creditText":"","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/ideas/","name":"Ideas"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/books/","name":"Books"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4970290/jennifer-egan-manhattan-beach/","name":"Review: A Heroine for Our Times in Jennifer Egan's Manhattan Beach"}}]}] ```