A Boston-Brahmin banker. A rags-to-riches immigrant hotelking. Two intermittently interesting, mostly clichéd life stories (1906–1967)—which unsubtle Archer (Shall We Tell the President?) has linked up [in Kane and Abel] using coincidences that belong only in Italian opera and plot secrets that only Dickens could get away with (and did)…. So how do these two heroes—both of them tiresomely brilliant and decent—hook up? Well, there's a brief teasing glimpse of waiter Abel serving William at the Plaza Hotel. But the real connection is made after Abel has become the indispensable right-hand man of a midwest hotelier: when the 1929 Crash comes, Abel and his boss need help from William's bank, William refuses, and Abel's beloved boss commits suicide. So Abel vows vengeance on William while—with aid from a mysterious anonymous backer(!)—he manages to salvage the hotel chain and achieve tycoon-dom. And with World War II...