It's got to go back out. Parallel to Clare's progress from soap manufacturer to global giant is Laura's discovery and battle against ovarian cancer, which grows with the same blind urgency as the corporation. Dos Passos's U.S.A. The two stories begin to dovetail when it's suggested Laura's cancer is the result of nearby Clare's manufacturing process. Powers is a masterful stylist, and the alternating stories tailor the language to the times. The style in the contemporary sections is comparatively sedate, the sentences shorter, though still quite imagistic, like the late great Stanley Elkin.
Powers is also a masterful researcher.
Laura's illness and chemotherapy treatments are related in such excruciating detail that I'd swear Powers went through it himself. Unlike Pynchon, Powers doesn't see evil or occult forces behind the growth of capitalism, and unlike Gaddis he doesn't show much outrage over the stupidity and greed that can pervert it. Instead, there's a curiously detached tone to the novel. Nevertheless, Gain is a brilliant, moving novel, and an enlightening account of the price our country has paid for its headlong pursuit of the almighty dollar.