Gagrule.net

Gagrule.net News, Views, Interviews worldwide

  • Home
  • About
  • Contact
  • GagruleLive
  • Armenia profile
  • ar Arabichy Armenianzh-CN Chinese (Simplified)nl Dutchen Englishfr Frenchde Germanel Greekit Italianpt Portugueseru Russianes Spanishtr Turkish
    en en

Books of The Times: In This Corner, an Armenian Pro Wrestler. In That Corner, Genocidal History.

December 30, 2019 By administrator

By John Williams,

Chris McCormick’s new novel, “The Gimmicks,” contains what might seem like a few gimmicks of its own, including forays into the worlds of competitive backgammon and professional wrestling. But those subcultures, emphasized in the book’s eye-catching cover design and promotional copy, are not what fuel it. It’s really about history — personal and collective — and it’s rooted in horrors from more than a century ago that are still making news today.

McCormick’s novel begins in the early 1970s, nearly 60 years after the Armenian genocide conducted by the Ottoman Empire, during which one and a half million Armenians were killed. Ruben Petrosian is a teenager living in Soviet Armenia who is obsessed with the fact that Turkey has not yet acknowledged or apologized for the crimes.

“Alliances with Turkey were growing around the world, not shrinking,” McCormick writes, “and even sympathetic governments were willing to ignore its denial for the right price.” (Earlier this month, the United States Senate voted unanimously to officially acknowledge the genocide as such. The Trump administration balked, calling the crimes “mass atrocities” as opposed to orchestrated genocide.)

Ruben is a promising backgammon player — but not as promising as his friend and rival Mina. She finds Ruben dour, and his fixation on the Turks and history boring. (“I was going to say male,” she declares, “but boring works, too.”) She compares constant focus on the past to lemon trees: “Imagine if they never dropped the dead lemons from last year, or the year before that. Just went on carrying all their old shriveled lemons until the branches sagged so low that no new fruit could grow.”

After an orphan named Avo Gregoryan arrives to live with Ruben and his family, the two boys come to think of themselves as brothers, though they are really cousins of cousins. Ruben is scowling and bespectacled, with “the look of an old man cursed to live in a child’s body.” Avo, 6-foot-6, is “an enormous but entirely sweet-hearted boy.”

When Mina is chosen to compete at a backgammon tournament in Paris, Ruben schemes to be sent in her place, seeing the trip as a chance to escape his country and expand the scope of his political activities. “We’re better than hurting a girl, yes,” Ruben tells Avo while they conspire against Mina, “but we’re also better than spending our lives in a drunken village in the corner of a dying empire, aren’t we?”

From afar, Ruben convinces Avo, then 19, to move to Los Angeles and join members of the Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia (Asala), a group intent on securing “global acknowledgment, apologies and reparations” for the genocide. The operatives in California make plans for an airport bombing and the assassination of a genocide-denying professor. But Avo’s heart is not in it. Ruben’s fervor never catches in his gentler cousin, who daydreams about returning to Armenia and Mina.

Instead, Avo is recruited to become a wrestler (named The Brow Beater, for his prominent unibrow) by Terry “Angel Hair” Krill, a washed-up manager who narrates sections of the novel set in the late 1980s.

A thumbnail sketch inevitably makes this novel sound overcrowded and jumbled, but McCormick keeps things admirably nimble, moving the stories forward while shuttling back and forth through time and across perspectives. Raised in California and Armenian on his mother’s side, he leans on real history, like Asala and its tactics, for his novel’s bones.

At a time when plot and contrivance in literary fiction are not the most fashionable things, McCormick, in his early 30s, proves adept at old-fashioned skills that one hopes will never go entirely unpracticed. With a minimum amount of soapiness, he keeps the pages turning on his love triangles and nostalgic wrestlers and brothers at peace and war. And he allows his larger themes to resonate without pushing them on us too hard.

One of those themes is the tides of history, and whether one can ever really decide to avoid them. “I want no trouble. I only want to be provincial,” Mina writes at one point in a journal, willing herself to believe that “the past is the past is the past.” Others include the line between justice and petty vengeance, in matters both large and small; the power (or lack thereof) in apologies; and the appeals and hazards of “pretending so well that we forgot we were pretending.”

McCormick only loses his footing on occasion. Avo speaks some jarringly (for him) profound and “written” observations, like this one about America: “Everything that makes sense in that country is terrible, and everything that’s nonsense has a kind of grace to it.” And Ruben is not quite as vivid on the page as his cousin — his fundamentalism is believable up to a point, but not conveyed with quite enough psychological detail to sell his most brutal decisions.

The novel draws to a close around one last devastating event from history, the 1988 earthquake in Armenia that killed tens of thousands. “We lost everything,” Mina says of relocating to America after the disaster. “We’re being careful not to lose anything else in the moving, you understand?”

Follow John Williams on Twitter: @johnwilliamsnyt.

The Gimmicks
By Chris McCormick
354 pages. Harper/HarperCollins Publishers. $27.99.

Share this:

  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) Facebook
  • Click to share on X (Opens in new window) X

Like this:

Like Loading...

Filed Under: Books, Genocide, News

Opinion | Haaretz Editorial Israel’s Fingerprints Are All Over the Ethnic Cleansing in Nagorno-Karabakh

The Armenians fleeing Nagorno-Karabakh en masse still remember the first years after the Soviet Union fell apart, when their community suffered war and mass slaughter.  But they also remember the more distant history of the genocide perpetrated against their countrymen by the Ottoman Empire. Consequently, they are rightly unwilling to rely on the mercy of […]

Pashinyan Falsely Blames Armenia’s Problems On the Trauma from the Genocide of 1915

By Harut Sassounian, With each passing day, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s statements contradicting Armenia’s national interests are getting increasingly alarming Pashinyan started by denigrating Mt. Ararat, the preeminent Armenian symbol. He then mocked Armenia’s coat of arms, questioning why there is a lion on it, claiming that there are no lions in Armenia. With this […]

ARMENIAN GENOCIDE DENIER NIKOL PASHINIAN, ANDRANIK KOCHARYAN

On April 24, the 109th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide, people’s thoughts and prayers always go to the martyrs of the genocide, to the year 1915, to the unquenchable fire of Tsitsernakaberd, to those fateful and difficult times that give reason to think about our current reality and forces to draw parallels with the past, […]

How Joe Biden Lost the Armenian American Vote

By Stephan Pechdimaldji, The 2024 presidential race is shaping up to be one of our country’s most hotly contested elections. With an electorate that has become more polarized than ever, independents and select demographic groups promise to play a more pivotal role in this year’s election. It is why Arab Americans in Michigan raised a lot […]

We Must Keep the Memory and Dream Alive To Recover Artsakh and Western Armenia

By Harut Sassounian, There is a dispute among those who want to struggle for the recovery of Artsakh and those who say that Artsakh is lost forever and that we should forget about it. The latter shameful position is promoted by the current regime in Armenia which is responsible for losing Artsakh and is now […]

Hrant Dink is commemorated at the place where he was shot

Hrant Dink, the founder and editor-in-chief of our newspaper, is commemorated at the place where he was shot on the 17th anniversary of his murder. There are also commemoration events in different cities and countries. The commemoration will take place on January 19 at 15.00 in front of the old Agos office, as every year. […]

Irvine, California Great Park, an Armenian Genocide memorial is in the works

The Orange County Armenian Genocide Memorial Committee hopes to start construction in the first half of 2026, By HANNA KANG, Irvine is getting closer to erecting a memorial dedicated to the victims of the Armenian genocide within the Great Park. Early plans for the memorial, approved by the Great Park Board on Tuesday, Jan. 9, include a potential […]

Investigation: Armenian Fears of a ‘Concentration Camp’ in Nagorno-Karabakh May Have Been Warranted

Newly available satellite imagery suggests a possible basis for rumors Azerbaijan was preparing to imprison the region’s residents. Late last spring, Armenian residents in the disputed territory of Nagorno-Karabakh heard the clamors and loud noises of construction work. At night, from their sleepy village of Khramort, they could see bright lighting and hear screeching noises […]

Armenian Christians attacked in Jerusalem, some in serious condition. “Armenian clerics in Jerusalem are fighting for their lives.”

Over 30 armed provocateurs wearing ski masks and some carrying lethal weapons attacked a group of Armenian bishops, priests, deacons, and other citizens on Thursday morning in the Old City of Jerusalem, according to the Armenian Patriarchate. “A mass and coordinated physical attack was launched,” the Patriarchate wrote in an official letter to the Police and […]

How could one man do so much damage to a nation? and How could such a nation remain muted? video

How could one man do so much damage to a nation?How could such a nation remain muted?How could such a nation endure so much Crime?

BREAKING: Ogun Samast, the Turkish assassin of Agos Newspaper’s Editor-in-Chief, Hrant Dink, released

BREAKING: In a turn of events, Ogun Samast, the individual responsible for the assassination of Agos Newspaper’s Editor-in-Chief, Hrant Dink, in a heinous attack on January 19, 2007, has been released from Bolu F-Type prison. Samast, who was 17 years old at the time of the murder, was apprehended at Samsun bus station on January […]

CSI calls for U.S. action to prevent a new Armenian Genocide

Says it is not too late to combat the malign influence of Azerbaijan and Turkey Christian Solidarity International (CSI) is urging the United States to put its words into action and call the perpetrators of ethnic cleansing in Nagorno Karabakh to account. In a letter to President Joe Biden dated November 9, CSI International President Dr. John […]

“Two Turkish agents with radical views discussing strategies to undermine their own nation’s stability.

A former Georgian president, Mikheil Saakashvili, who was involved in a conflict with Russia that resulted in the loss of significant territory, is currently advising Nikol Pashinyan, the Prime Minister of Armenia. Pashinyan, too, experienced a loss in the Artsakh region during his tenure. They are seeking guidance on managing their relations with Russia. Critics […]

Reuters: Azerbaijan has a list of hundreds of Karabakh Armenians it wants to detain

Azerbaijan has a list of several hundred Armenians from Nagorno-Karabakh whom it wants to detain on charges of various crimes, Reuters reports, citing a “senior diplomat”. “Azerbaijan has a list of “several hundred” Armenians in Karabakh whom they want to detain on charges of various crimes,” the agency reported. Azerbaijan has already detained Ruben Vardanyan, […]

Artsakh: 88,780 forcibly displaced persons arrived in Armenia from Karabakh as of 10 am Friday

As of 10 a.m. Friday, 88,780 forcibly displaced persons have entered Armenia from Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh). Nazeli Baghdasaryan, press secretary of the Armenian prime minister, informed about this during the press conference presenting the activities of the respective humanitarian centers that has been set up. “It can be seen from the numeric dynamics that a certain […]

“Vito stays in Artsakh, Samvel Babayan is in Armenia how did he manage to live? Video

Samvel Babayan, a deceptive liar watched the video when he said I am the last one to live but he is first to run now he is the first he is in Armenia. “As if I came to Africa, you are surprised, I came to my country. The journalist asked me: when will you come, […]

Righteous Jews Urge Pro-Azeri Rabbis To Cancel Planned Conference in Baku

By Harut Sassounian, Shortly after I wrote a column two weeks ago condemning European pro-Azerbaijan Rabbis for planning to hold their conference in Baku, I was pleasantly surprised to receive an email from 18 mostly Jewish prominent individuals, including eight righteous Rabbis, who condemned the trip to Azerbaijan and called for its cancellation. In a […]

Luis Moreno Ocampo the USA, France, and Russia can stop the Karabakh Genocide By Azerbaijan in one minute detail in a Video

It’s like a shock, but it’s obvious, it’s a #genocide today, and the question is not to debate the genocide but to prevent the killings in Nagorno Karabakh. (First Prosecutor of Intl. Criminal Court – Luis Moreno Ocampo) #ArtsakhBlockade #AzerbaijanIsATerroristState

Aliyev Genocide can’t be said in public, State Department official Yuri Kim: Video

Bob Menendez։ Azerbaijan’s Blockade of Artsakh has Hallmark of Genocide Unreal. I’ve never witnessed anything like this. Yuri Kim, a State Department official, says she can’t publicly answer why Azerbaijan’s dictator has kept the Lachin corridor closed — meaning she knows his plans are to starve Artsakh into coercion. A deeply troubling non-answer that speaks […]

Genocide is About to Unfold in Artsakh, and the West Has Secured a Front-Row Seat

by Karnig Kerkonian  For seventeen days, Azerbaijani special forces and military personnel—masquerading as “environmentalists”—have blocked the only road connecting Artsakh to Armenia. They have effectively severed the only lifeline the Artsakh Armenians have to the outside world—a lifeline guaranteed by the Trilateral Statement of November 10, 2020. With 120,000 Artsakh Armenians now completely encircled and isolated, Azerbaijan is […]

US senator urges sanctions on Azerbaijan to prevent ‘genocide’

A top senator on Tuesday urged the United States to impose sanctions on Azerbaijan’s leader, accusing him of starting a campaign of “genocide” against an ethnic Armenian enclave, charges rejected by Baku. Armenia has accused Azerbaijan of spurring a humanitarian crisis by closing Armenia’s only road link into Nagorno-Karabakh, although the enclave’s separatist authorities said […]

In an effort to whitewash its criminal record, Azerbaijan unilaterally decides to send ‘aid’ to victims of its blockade

At the behest of the #Azerbaijani regime associated with terrorism, there is a pattern of altering the attire of terrorists to align with their propagandistic narrative. These individuals, who are consistently identified as terrorists, exhibit a versatile facade. They might portray themselves as members of the Red Crescent on one occasion, only to swiftly transform […]

Turks are well taught that the Diaspora should be defeated first so that the issue of Armenia can be easily resolved. Yunona Hakobjanyan

People in Armenia have become a little more desperate and indifferent. But at the same time, people understand well what is happening around them. Los Angeles-based doctor and public figure Yunona Hakobjanyan said on the air of 168TV’s “Review” program, talking about the impressions she got from her visit to Armenia this time. According to […]

Understanding Azerbaijan’s Blockade of the Lachin Corridor as Part of a Wider Genocidal Campaign

The Tip of the Iceberg Understanding Azerbaijan’s Blockade of the Lachin Corridor asPart of a Wider Genocidal Campaign against Ethnic Armenians. IntroductionAs the world condemns Azerbaijan’s blockade of the Lachin Corridor, we must not lose sight ofthe deeper threat fueling the humanitarian catastrophe: the full-scale ethnic cleansing and potentialgenocide of Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh 1 and […]

Why Do We Expect the World to Care?

By now, most informed Armenians have digested the results of the emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council on the closure of the Berdzor (Lachin) Corridor and the dire situation in our beloved Artsakh—the humanitarian disaster that is unfolding before our eyes. The result is the same that Armenians have grown accustomed to over the […]

Surprisingly few people know these two Aliev sixes in Armenia.

By Aleksander Lapshin, Surprisingly few people know these two Aliev sixes in Armenia. Meanwhile, all the evil that Ilhamostan is doing against Armenia and Artsakh comes from these two. On the left head of the SGB, General Ali Nagiev, and on the right head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, General Vilayat Evazov. All abductions, […]

In the year 626 Armenian Patriarch of Jerusalem Abraham traveled to Mecca and met with Prophet Mohammed

By Hay Wanderer In the year 626 Armenian Patriarch of Jerusalem, Abraham traveled to Mecca and met with Prophet Mohammed. After the meeting, Prophet Mohammed issued a declaration that recognized and respected the Armenian Church with its Patriarch and followers. Prophet Mohammed commanded all Muslims to respect his declaration. In the year 1187 Salah al […]

Righteous Jews Appeal to Israel To Help Open the Lachin Corridor

By Harut Sassounian, There are pro and anti-Armenian individuals of every nationality. Jews are no exception. There are Jews who support us and those who oppose us. We should not generalize and paint everyone with the same brush. Armenians should not treat every Jew as an opponent just because the Israeli government denies the Armenian […]

Turkey MFA appeals to their Turkish Agent in Armenia

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) of Turkey issued a statement in the context of the developments related to the Lachin corridor. Turkey’s MFA called on Armenia to back off from provocative moves, to recognize Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity, to support the use of the Aghdam-Stepanakert and other roads for the needs of Karabakh’s Armenian population, […]

The situation confronting Artsakh,

an Armenian region is intricate. Artsakh is ensnared between two authoritarian leaders, both nurturing equal hostility towards it. The Armenian leader, Pashinyan, who leans towards a pro-Turkey stance, has officially recognized Artsakh as part of Azerbaijan. Simultaneously, the Azerbaijani dictator persists in isolating Artsakh, subjecting it to a siege for the past 8 months, affecting […]

@ArmeniaUN PR has sent a ltr to the #UNSC prez requesting an urgent Council mtg, #LachinCorridor blockade by Azerbaijan

@ArmeniaUN PR has sent an ltr to the #UNSC prez @USAmbUN requesting an urgent Council mtg concerning the #LachinCorridor blockade by Azerbaijan and the resulting “deteriorating humanitarian situation”. @SCProcedure @SCRtweets @UN_Spokesperson

Global Attention Alert: Video

Armenia’s disengagement from Russia and Entanglement with Turkey resulted in Escalating Numbers of Political Detainees. Armenia Adopts Aspects of Turkey’s Political System, Leading to the Establishment of a Controversial Law Enforcement System Resembling Turkey’s. #PoliticalPrisoners

Expert Opinion: Genocide against Armenians in 2023 Video

By Luis Moreno Ocampo, There is an ongoing Genocide against 120,000 Armenians The blockade of the Lachin Corridor by the Azerbaijani security forces impeding access to any food, medical supplies, and other essentials to Nagorno-Karabakh is in the media since December 2022 and it is discussed by political leaders.  My contribution is to explain why […]

Heart-wrenching Circumstance, Pashinyan Sale Artsakh Aliyev ensuing Artsakh Blockade Karo fail Victim.

Heart-wrenching Circumstance In the wake of NikolPashinyan’s acknowledgment of Artsakh as a Part of Azerbaijan and the ensuing Artsakh Blockade implemented by Azerbaijan, we find ourselves in a deeply poignant situation. Meet Karo, an innocent and gentle soul afflicted with diabetes, epilepsy, and a multitude of other ailments. Tragically, Karo’s supply of essential medications is […]

Armenians Are Once Again Facing Genocide. The Time To Act Is Now | Opinion

SOSEH HOVASAPIAN, ANI ARZOUMANIAN, AND SHARON ANOUSH CHEKIJIAN , CORNELL UNIVERSITY; COLGATE UNIVERSITY; YALE SCHOOL OF MEDICINE  For over 230 days, a humanitarian crisis has loomed over Artsakh, or Nagorno-Karabakh, an autonomous, ethnically Armenian region within the internationally recognized borders of Azerbaijan. The world has yet to take notice, and why should it? This seemingly unimportant area in […]

@AntonyBlinken sees the Famine with one Eye Nagorno-Karabakh the New Darfur?

By Michael Rubin, Speaking at the United Nations last week, Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke out about famine, quoting President Biden’s declaration, “If parents cannot feed their children, nothing else matters.” It was unfortunate, but symptomatic of his cynicism, that Blinken ignored the famine underway in Nagorno-Karabakh caused exclusively by Azerbaijan’s illegal blockade. Rather […]

French historian Marc Knobel denounces the decision to hold a European conference for rabbis in Azerbaijan.

Messieurs les rabbins, j’ai honte et je suis juif » TRIBUNE. L’historien et essayiste Marc Knobel s’indigne de la prochaine tenue de la conférence des rabbins européens en Azerbaïdjan, pays en conflit avec l’Arménie. Il est comme cela des effets d’annonce et des informations qui glacent le sang, et mon sang n’a fait qu’un tour. Sur un […]

Opinion “The Turkish Dream: A Man’s Ambition Amidst the Siege of 120,000 Humans”

Since 2008, when Nikol Pashinyan was unleashed upon the Armenian nation we believe by Turkey, and other foreign power a relentless wave of death and destruction has swept over Armenia and Artsakh. Pashinyan’s Turkish Dream began with a massive attack on the Armenian government, leading to the massacre of ten people, including a policeman, and […]

Alert: Armenian of the Western United States joining other community members in a rally for #Artsakh this Sunday, August 6, 2023.

Starting point: St. Leon Armenian Cathedral at 3:00 PM 3325 N. Glenoaks Blvd, Burbank, CA 91504 Rally For Life… Sunday, August 6, at 3:00 p.m., show up to this in enormous numbers for it’s impactful, attracts the media, and sends a message to the Biden Administration to stop the resumption of the Armenian Genocide. Where: St. Leon […]

Jewish rabbis to join the conference in Genocidal Azerbaijan as Jewish ties flourish, Aliyev Petrodollar hard at work

By Yossi Lempkowicz, This is the first such gathering in a Muslim nation. Historically, Azerbaijan is home to three distinct Jewish communities with the country devoid of antisemitism. By Etgar Lefkovits, JNS Hundreds of European rabbis from across the continent will be gathering in Azerbaijan this fall to discuss Jewish affairs in the first such […]

More Posts from this Category

Copyright © 2025 · News Pro Theme on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in

ar Arabichy Armenianzh-CN Chinese (Simplified)nl Dutchen Englishfr Frenchde Germanel Greekit Italianpt Portugueseru Russianes Spanishtr Turkish
en en
%d