In her debut novel, Lara Heller delves into the often unseen protagonist, Nationality Ace. Born in America, Nationality Ace is a twenty-two-year-old whose parents were immigrants from Czech. As an immigrant himself, he feels the need to make his mark and pursue his destiny in his adopted homeland. However, he soon finds that his birth country’s system is less than ideal for an American like him. As Nationality’s lack of support causes him constant headaches, he takes on a job as a translator for an advertising agency, but his employer’s strict policies about height and national origin prevent him from taking up this extra work.
On a lark, Nationality takes up an adventure to prove to his new company that his English skills are worthy of the position. Despite his misgivings about the nature of the enterprise, Nationality embarks on the venture, traveling to London and eventually settling down in a small English town called Stratford-upon-Avon. There, Nationality slowly becomes involved with the community, working as an accountant and shopkeeper. However, his luck continues to be bad, and when a royal commission is held to investigation the murder of a crown prince, Nationality is accused and taken away in an American plane crash. In order to clear his name, Nationality must travel back to England on the doomed flight, where he teams up with another man named Paul Keough who believes that Nationality may still have a chance to prove himself.
As the plot unravels and the two men become unlikely allies, the reader begins to see how Nationality’s situation plays out. The novel ends with a twist that left me confused about how much sense the story was making. At one point, it seemed as if Nationality had actually died in the plane crash, but then he was miraculously back in the novel thanks to the actions of one of his companions. Despite this ending, I find that Heller does a good job of keeping the narrative compelling throughout its length.