title: “Say It Ain T So Joe” ShowToc: true date: “2023-01-03” author: “George Steven”
Now Heller has written a sequel to “Catch-22,” Closing Time (464 pages. Simon & Schuster. $24), in which he picks up his characters 50 years later. Yossarian is mounting a society wedding. The chaplain is found to be passing radioactive urine. Milo Minderbinder is an arms merchant. This sounds like vintage Heller, but it’s all premise and no payoff. The life has gone out of these people, and worse yet the life has gone out of Heller. Yossarian deserves better and so do we. Shame on you, Joe Heller, for not leaving well enough alone.
