In Newark, New Jersey, during the “war years,” Seymour “the Swede” Levov is the hero of his community, a gifted athlete onto whom the neighborhood’s Jewish boys project all their aspirations. The novel’s narrator—Nathan Zuckerman—befriends the Swede’s younger brother, Jerry. Playing ping pong at the Levovs’ house, he catches glimpses of the Swede’s inner sanctum. There, he discovers a series of young adult baseball novels in which the naïve and noble protagonist suffers the capricious cruelties of life.

The Swede’s grandfather, an immigrant from the (unidentified) “old country,” finds work in a tannery, and his father follows, eventually starting his own business manufacturing ladies’ gloves, becoming very wealthy in the process. After graduation, the Swede enlists in the Marines, but the bombing of Hiroshima ends the war before he sees any action. After a stint as a drill instructor at Parris Island (a Marine boot camp), the Swede enrolls in college, becoming a star for the baseball team. He turns down an offer to play pro, choosing instead to work for his father. He marries Dawn Dwyer, a former Miss New Jersey whose non-Jewish identity serves as a further marker of the Swede’s successful assimilation: “He’d done it” (15).