MARY & ETHEL AND MIKEY WHO?

A musical theater superfan follows his heroes through time in Cole’s novel.

In Brooklyn, 1983, 25-year-old Michael Marvin Minkus—Mikey for short—loves one person more than anyone on earth: Ethel Merman. He lives with his widowed mother, Rifka, in a small apartment where, perpetually in-between jobs, he pores over his collection of records, posters, and clippings related to his idol. To his horror, he reads news in the tabloids of Ethel Merman’s inoperable brain tumor. Despite the odds, Mikey manages to sneak his way into Ethel’s apartment—and arrives there while another Broadway legend, Mary Martin, happens to be visiting her old rival for the first time in a year. As if that weren’t fantastic enough, Mikey takes the opportunity to snoop around in Ethel’s closet…and ends up, in Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe style, transported back to the dressing room of the Imperial Theatre in 1939. There he meets Ethel and Mary while they are young and on the cusp of stardom. Through a series of similarly magical leaps, Mikey follows the two through the rest of their careers, appearing always at moments when the two frenemies cross paths. Is this the ultimate dream come true for the ultimate fan? Or will Mikey learn why it’s usually better not to meet your heroes? Cole’s rapturous prose succeeds in capturing Mikey’s fanboy ecstasy at getting to witness so many significant moments from musical history: “Mikey’s head almost spun off of his neck in pleasure. He was there when South Pacific was being conceived! He might have even helped decide its fate by suggesting Dick and Oscar as the authors. Oh, how he hoped he would be around for the birth, too.” The book seems made for readers who, like Mikey, can’t get enough of Merman and Martin. There’s plenty of Ethel and Mary, though not a ton of plot, and readers who aren’t so steeped in Broadway lore may find themselves somewhat bored.

A fun time-travel novel for an extremely specific audience.