Random Acts of Heroic Love by Danny Scheinmann

I enjoyed reading this book although I also had some major problems with it. There are two stories - one of a young man traveling in South America whose girlfriend gets killed in the early 2000s, and the other of a young soldier during WWI. Each of the narratives is interesting enough and the characters were well-written.

The stories alternate and ultimately tie together in a familiar, almost formulaic way. I don't think I've grown tired of every book written in this way (see A Brief History of the Dead and The Blind Assassin) but I think Scheinmann's execution was unimpressive. It was like he had two books in him and decided to find a way to tie them together.

Two factors, however, soften my opinion of the book. One is that this is a first novel and the other is that the WWI story is based on his own grandfather's story. It was kind of cool to find that out in the end and realize that this was a way for him to be closer to family history.